School funding crisis ‘to cost 3,000 jobs’
At least 3,000 teachers are to lose their jobs because of the funding crisis in schools, according to a survey in the Times newspaper.
The paper suggests that the funding crisis will also lead to thousands more teachers on temporary contracts being told that they are to lose their jobs next term.
The survey follows a Croydon school’s decision to send pupils home to save money. The paper is claiming that a second school in Croydon is going to have to send children home for half a day a week because of a 10% fall in school funding.
The Government increased school funding by 11.6% this year but schools are claiming that they have seen only a small amount of money reach them or none at all.
David Hart, general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) warned that the Government’s plans to improve schools were in danger of being derailed because the money wasn’t reaching schools.
The Education and Skills Secretary, Charles Clarke argued that the Government had increased school funding by £2.7 billion year and it was the local education authorities who were to blame for £597 million of the money not reaching schools.
However, Mr Hart claimed that the Government had underestimated the funding problems in state education and has been playing catch-up ever since.
The Times survey of NAHT branch secretaries revealed the loss of a total of 500 teachers and 200 classroom assistants. If these figures were applied nationally this would mean more than 3,000 teachers and 1,500 classroom assistants are to lose their jobs.
Mr Hart stated, ‘The effects of this crisis are clearly going to be larger class sizes, cuts in curriculum, and an inability by schools to deliver the workforce reforms on which the Government is pinning so much.’
