Government needs to find £1.3 billion more for schools, says think tank
The Education Policy Institute has warned that without this additional money there is likely to be a 3% reduction in per pupil funding by 2022.
The EPI today released a research note entitled “Where next on school funding and the National Funding Formula?” The analysis shows that the £4 billion commitment made by the Conservatives in their manifesto would not be sufficient to protect schools from a real-terms reduction in per pupil spending.
An additional £1.3 billion would be needed to address the inflationary pressures faced by schools. The authors note that this may rise to £2 billion given that the Government has scrapped their plans to abolish universal infant free school meals.
In assessing the next steps in school funding, the EPI notes that the DfE now faces a number of challenges in implementing the national funding formula as originally proposed.
The Department’s intention was to begin a phased implementation of the new formula from April of next year with all schools on the formula by 2019-20. The EPI notes that the government now faces a “challenging timetable” in order to achieve this, as plans would have to be announced before the summer recess in two week’s time.
You can read the full report here.