An Opposition Day Debate was called last week in Parliament to highlight the cuts to school funding and the impact they are having on the ability of children to reach their full potential. Labour are also calling on the Government to ensure that all schools have the funding they need to provide an excellent education for every child.

Ministers are planning to introduce a new National Funding Formula for schools. They are not, however, putting in sufficient funding to implement this in a fair way. Campaigners say that 98% of schools across England will be worse off at a time when they face real terms cuts to their funding.

Figures released by the National Union of Teachers giving the projected impact of the cuts to schools funding at a constituency level show that York Central is set to lose £226 per pupil over this parliament (2015-19) and that from 2013-19 the constituency will see a 9% reduction in funding per pupil.

The Government are overseeing the first real terms cut in the schools budget for over two decades, the steepest our schools have faced since the 1970s and the Institute For Fiscal Studies have predicted that this will equate to around £3bn worth of savings that schools need to make to counteract cost pressures.

We are already in a situation where nationally, 60.6% of secondary academies spent more than their income in 2014/15, and these cuts will only make the situation worse as under the Government’s proposals for a new Funding Formula, nearly half of all schools (46%) in the country will lose funding.

Rachael Maskell MP is calling on the Secretary of State for Education to make urgent representations to the Chancellor to deliver extra resources for schools in his Budget statement to Parliament on 8th March.

Rachael Maskell, MP for York Central says:
“The combination of this new Funding Formula and further cuts to the school budgets will put our schools into an even more difficult position than the one they are already facing.

“The Government has spoken of “levelling the playing field” and a system funding “schools according to the needs of their pupils rather than their postcode”. These changes will do nothing of the sort. They will make the situation worse as schools will see further cuts to their already struggling budgets, meaning spending per-pupil will fall, hindering their ability to reach their potential.

“In York schools are already under pressure and without additional resources the situation will become more challenged which will result on even more pressure on teachers and staff and less investment in the next generation.

“I am encouraging residents to view the website www.schoolcuts.org.uk to see what the cuts could mean for schools in their area. The site also includes a petition to the Chancellor which only takes a few minutes to sign”.