The huge mess the government made in September over their funding figures brought to light the serious shortfall in funding that schools face.
While our school buildings crumble, teachers leave in their droves, and 92 per cent of schools face more real-terms budget cuts from April, the Chancellor and the Prime Minister have pledged not one extra penny for schools in the Autumn Statement. You and our children deserve so much more.
Children’s education will suffer. Staff redundancies will happen and terms and conditions will be put on the table as heads try to balance budgets.
An alarming 18,484 schools (92%), both primary and secondary, will be unable to cope with cost increases in 2024/25 without making cuts to education provision. This means 99% of secondary schools and 91% of primary schools
will need to make cuts to survive
Autumn Statement
Our schools are in crisis. The Government must demonstrate it values education by urgently investing in school buildings, in educator pay to address staff shortages, SEN funding and in per-pupil funding to make sure every child gets the best start in life.
The Chancellor’s statement does nothing to repair the damage caused by 13 years of cuts. The Government will pay a heavy political price for continuing to ignore the problems it has created. Schools must be protected from further financial pressure.
Currently Britain spends just 3.9% of national income on education. This is the lowest proportion for more than twenty years and compares poorly with other developed nations, the OECD average is 5%. England’s schools have the largest
primary class sizes in Europe and secondary class sizes are the highest since records began.
Look up your school on schoolcuts.org.uk
What can you do?
- Set up a local campaign
- Involve other teaching and support staff unions
- Identify local councillors to write to and ask for support
- Identify key parent groups
- Use the school cuts website to show how devastating
these cuts are - Fight any and all redundancies