Clarke rejects direct funding of schools
The Education Secretary has rejected suggestions that schools should be funded directly by Government.
Charles Clarke is due to announce Labour’s five year plan for schools in the Commons on Thursday and there has been some speculation that the trailed increased “freedom” for schools will mean a reduced role for Local Education Authorities (LEAs).
2003 saw a bitter row erupt between the Government and LEAs over the allocation of resources to schools. Despite a £2.7 billion increase in overall funding from Whitehall, a number of headteachers complained that they were facing a funding shortfall.
The Government blamed the LEAs for withholding or failing to allocate cash to the schools, whilst the LEAs claimed they had not received sufficient funds to cover increased expenses, such as a rise in teachers’ pension contributions.
On Wednesday the new chair of the Local Government Association (LGA), Sir Sandy Lockhart, claimed that the Government had failed to consult with it on the new plans, branding it a “serious breakdown in the working of the central/local partnership”.
“It is Government that has a grip on schools not local councils. It is Government and Government alone that attaches the strings and prescription on to school funding such as the standards fund and the bid funding that schools have to apply for from Government departments.”
“Last year the Government blamed local authorities for withholding funding to schools and they were proved to be wrong. They are wrong again. The way to freeing up schools is to end the funding formulas that dictate down to the last penny how local authorities and headteachers spend their resources. “
Speaking to the Commons Education Select Committee on Wednesday, Mr Clarke said that LEAs “have a very important role to play” in funding and he rejected the suggestion that schools should be funded directly by the Government.
He said he was in favour of “‘strengthening certainty” in light of last year’s funding problems, but he appeared unconvinced about the merits of a national funding agency.
Rejecting suggestions from the committee that he was of merely applying a “sticking plaster” to the funding problems, Mr Clarke stressed that funding was a “partnership with the department and local government” and said the true test of the approach would come in 2005/06.
Accepting that some parts of the system are “ramshackle” Mr Clarke said that budgets would be set over three years to give schools certainty and an ability to plan for the future.
He also argued that the financial management systems that had been put in place diminished the chances of schools encountering the problems witnessed last year.
The Secretary of State conceded that the department had often been guilty of under spending, and although he acknowledged that this had been for good reason, he said he was confident that this would not be repeated.
