Staff cuts are damaging the curriculum and leaving vulnerable pupils without support, headteachers have warned, as they called on the prime minister to increase school funding ahead of this week’s Budget.
School leaders representing 250 schools across England have backed an open letter to Andy Burnham, demanding an additional £4.5 billion to restore schools’ spending power to 2010 levels.
The letter, organised by the Stop School Cuts campaign, says leaders have made cuts to teaching and support staff, reduced provision for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities and carried out building maintenance themselves.
It comes before chancellor John Healey’s first Autumn Budget on Wednesday 28 October, with headteachers warning that schools are struggling to maintain provision.
Staff cuts ‘damage’ curriculum
Rob Pavey, headteacher of Cheney School in Oxfordshire, said he had cut 10 teachers over the past two years because of financial pressures.
“All of this harms the chances of children, all of this does damage to the curriculum,” he added.
Jan Conley, headteacher of St Finbar’s Catholic Primary School in Liverpool, said the number of learning support assistants across the school’s eight classes had fallen from eight to three in six years.
“We are financially and literally on our knees,” she said, adding that the school had above-average levels of deprivation and high levels of SEND.
Unions call for Budget action
The Stop School Cuts campaign, backed by education unions, previously estimated that more than nine in 10 secondary schools had less spending power than in 2010.
Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said that more funding was required to allow mainstream schools to support pupils with complex SEND.
“While extra funding has been allocated, it is unlikely to be anywhere near enough to provide the specialist high-quality provision that these children require,” said Mr Di’Iasio.
He also warned that, in general terms, schools “continue to operate under huge financial pressures as a result of rising costs and the ever-increasing expectations placed upon them”.
Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the NEU teaching union, said school leaders were being forced into “impossible daily choices” and called on the government to restore funding.
And Paul Whiteman, general secretary of the NAHT school leaders’ union, said heads could not continue to “plug ever-growing gaps alone”.
