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Funding

 
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Schools are at breaking point as funding is not keeping up with the expenditure schools face. The government’s funding commitment for schools is not adequate and equates to a real-terms cut in education spending. The situation is critical for schools, so NAHT is campaigning to:

Lobby the government to provide sufficient funding for the education of all pupils 

 

  • Support the School Cuts campaign
  • Lobby for provision of accessible and available health, social care and other therapeutic services to support pupils' educational progress and attainment
  • Lobby for sufficient funding for the High Needs block
  • Lobby for sufficient funding to support pupils with SEND in all mainstream schools
  • Lobby for more funding for early years education; including specific funding to stabilise and protect the maintained nursery school sector
  • Support the Raise the Rate campaign to ensure sufficient funding for students in sixth form / FE / KS5 education
  • Maximise the funding for pupil premium for schools through auto enrolment
  • Press the government to provide appropriate support to schools for financial planning and resource management
  • Develop a better understanding of the unique challenges facing small schools and lobby the government to ensure their long-term sustainability
  • Lobby government to introduce the hard funding formula

Lobby to ensure that schools have sufficient funds to provide a safe environment for pupils and staff

  • Press for the phased removal of asbestos from the school estate
  • Lobby the DfE to secure sufficient capital funding and restoration of the school estate where required
  • Press the government to ensure that health and safety regulations maintain the highest standard of safety within schools
  • Lobby the DfE to support members to effectively manage the school estate

Government announcement on school funding

Last Friday, the government made a substantial announcement on school funding, promising an ‘increase in school funding’ of over £14.4bn.  It’s important to note that this represents the total cumulative cost over three years, not the additional sum that schools will receive.

This means that by 2022/23 school funding will be £7.1billion higher than it is now, and includes a promise of £700m of SEND funding for one year. The government has also committed £4.4bn over three years to fund the cost of increases to employers’ pension costs.  The announcement includes a promise that all primary schools will receive minimum funding of £4,000 per pupil, and secondaries £5,000 per pupil.

This represents a very significant increase and is a result of the extensive lobbying and dogged campaigning by NAHT members.  Our high profile campaign has included petitions, surveys, press releases, lobbying, pledges and negotiations.  We have made sure that school funding has stayed at the very top of the political agenda.

NAHT has offered a cautious welcome.  However, as always, the devil is in the detail.  We have yet to see the ‘Red Book’ setting out the underlying analysis.  Some of the additional funding is likely to be growth in pupil numbers, inflation and the cost associated with raising starting salaries for all new teachers to £30,000.  We will be conducting a full review of the detail when this is available.

The Education Policy Institute have provided helpful initial blog and analysis on the announcement, and research on the impact of levelling up per pupil funding.

First published 04 September 2019

First published 04 September 2019
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