WORCESTER Labour chiefs have slammed the Conservative ‘maths bungle’ which will leave schools in Worcester nearly £660,000 worse off next year
The Department for Education last month admitted to miscalculating the amounts of funding due to be granted to state schools in England next year, copping to a £370million error in the information they gave schools in July.
Permanent secretary Susan Acland-Hood has apologised and education secretary Gillian Keegan has ordered a review of DfE quality assurance processes after identifying an error forecasting pupil numbers.
Analysis of updated funding figures by Labour has found schools in Worcester will be on average £27,492 worse off, or £46 per pupil down next year due to the Conservatives’ school budget maths bungle.
Schools in Worcester are set to be £659,805 worse off in total while across the county schools are set to be worse off by £3,720,933 in total
Labour said the latest gaffe at the Department for Education will cause yet more pain for schools already struggling to balance budgets after years of uncertainty over long-term funding and threatened to further weaken the relationship between local schools and families.
The party said that trust in the schools system was already at breaking point due to the days of learning missed by children in recent years.
A large group of parents in Worcestershire have declared a crisis in the county’s provision for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), with a protest taking place outside County Hall even before the pandemic.
Labour also pointed to the decisions taken by the Conservatives to open pubs before schools during covid, to prolong strike action by refusing to negotiate with trade unions, and to cut funding for school rebuilding, leading to the dangerous RAAC concrete crisis which has affected hundreds of schools, causing many to shut their doors.
Tom Collins, Labour’s candidate to be Worcester’s next MP, said: “Our schools are in crisis and children are already being failed by years of cuts. My children are expected to know long division, yet we have a government that doesn’t seem to be able to add.
“This kind of incompetence and mismanagement seems to have become typical of this government, we deserve so much better.
“Education is at the very heart of Labour’s values. It is vital that we invest in our children, and Labour is committed to turning things around.
“A Labour government will recruit 6,500 more teachers, put breakfast clubs in primary schools and mental health counsellors in every secondary school.”
