It is good to see that during the half-term break pressure has continued to build over the school funding crisis – both the overall level of frontline funding and over calls for action on the flawed national funding formula.
The government has already pledged to act on fairer school funding, although we still await details of exactly what action it plans to take. However, the prospects of action on the overall levels of school funding look a lot bleaker.
Make no mistake, the situation is stark. Despite government rhetoric about protecting frontline education funding, schools are facing severe real-term spending cuts that will have a devastating effect in many areas. School leaders know this, I know this, and ministers too must admit to this.
Schools were relatively protected from the deep government cuts during the last Parliament, although still faced incredibly difficult budget situations.
However, an article published by the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) has now set out the grave situation facing schools during this current Parliament (1).
It highlights key cost increases including increased employer National Insurance contributions from April 2016 and the one per cent public sector pay increase.
The article states: “Taking these together with pressures on other costs, we forecast that school spending per-pupil is likely to fall by around eight per cent in real-terms between 2014/15 and 2019/20. This will be the first time since the mid-1990s that school spending has fallen in real-terms.”
At the same time, pupil numbers are expected to rise by 450,000 to 6.9 million in 2020, with the number of teachers therefore also needing to increase by 30,000 to 480,000 if we are to keep the pupil-teacher ratio that we have now.
All of this means a perfect storm is brewing, with the outcome being likely that schools will be forced to focus increasingly on their core academic offering to the detriment of many other areas – pastoral, less popular GCSE subjects, extra-curricular activities, and so on.
Also during half-term, 111 MPs signed a letter to the prime minister (2) calling for the introduction of a new national fair funding formula from 2017/18. The current system sees some areas receiving per-pupil funding of more than £6,000 while others get just £4,200.
The Conservatives pledged in their election manifesto to tackle the historical inequities in the system and education secretary Nicky Morgan has come under pressure (most recently from the Education Select Committee) to set out her plans soon (3). The letter was organised by f40 – a campaign group made up of the worst-funded local authorities in England.
However, the IFS article warns that a solution on this front will be “particularly difficult for policy-makers to implement when overall school spending per-pupil will be frozen in cash-terms”. It states: “Delivering a cash-terms increase to some schools or local authorities as a part of a set of reforms would require cash-terms cuts to some other groups of schools or local authorities.”
The message is clear. Fairer funding is not possible without more funding. The government cannot cut everything. It must acknowledge at some point that education, a service that is so vital to a flourishing society, needs bolstering if we are to cope with huge rises in pupil numbers and the increasing problems caused by wider austerity.
With so many cuts to local authority services, it is clear that schools have been picking up the pieces – and the bill – across many areas, not least mental health support and family issues.
Indeed, schools currently spend an average of £43.5 million a year on unfunded services for pupils, including food, clothes and washing facilities, as a result of wider austerity – according to an analysis by the National Association of Head Teachers (4). This kind of vital activity is now under threat too.
Just think for a second where we might be in 2020. What the situation might look like for the worst-funded schools and the poorest families.
Doing nothing is not an option. Action is needed now. Yes, we must tackle fairer school funding and I echo the call from the Association of School and College Leaders for this to be included in the autumn spending review on November 25.
But this alone will not do. Schools need more money. If not, many will hit a financial wall, the impact of which will be devastating for the life chances of many children and young people – particularly those who are already disadvantaged.
- Pete Henshaw is the editor of SecEd and has been writing about secondary education for more than 10 years. Email editor@sec-ed.co.uk and follow him on Twitter @pwhenshaw
References
- English Schools Will Feel the Pinch Over the Next Five Years (IFS, October 2015): www.ifs.org.uk/publications/8027
- MPs’ letter to the prime minister (f40): http://bit.ly/1kVkEjD
- Nicky Morgan Under Pressure Over Fairer Funding Promise, SecEd, September 2015: http://bit.ly/1LNJJ60
- Schools Spending £43.5m a Year to Meet Basic Needs, SecEd, May 2015: http://bit.ly/20contg