Responding to planned cuts to the 2023/24 education and Welsh language budgets by the Welsh government, Laura Doel, National Secretary of NAHT Cymru said:

“Such a significant funding cut from the education and Welsh language budget is deeply concerning, but not unexpected given the £900m gap in the Welsh government’s budget.

“We have been very clear that core funding for schools must be protected and that ring-fenced government grants for education improvement and deprivation funding must remain in place at a bare minimum.

“Inflationary pressures go far beyond government, with schools already struggling to make ends meet, so we are urging the government to look at all areas of education spending in order to protect frontline services.

“The current government review of the costly school improvement consortia is crucial to ensure they offer at least the same value as investing in teachers and leaders. But we would also like to see a pause on projects such as reviewing the school day and year, and community-focused schools, that do little to improve the education attainment of children and young people.

“Protecting education is an investment in the future of Wales and therefore the government and local authorities must continue to work with education unions and the profession to keep the school gates open.

“Current funding levels are already seeing schools having to make redundancies to balance their books. Anything further would seriously jeopardise schools’ ability to function.”

Responding to a cut in the primary school free school meals budget of £11.5m, Laura Doel added: “The government seems confident that there are sufficient funds to continue with universal provision and we hope this is the case. 

“However, what we cannot see is universal free school meals becoming another costly burden for schools to pick up later in the financial year. Having to absorb the ongoing costs of this provision would cripple schools and would undoubtedly lead to further staff redundancies.”