ASCL comment on IFS report on education funding

Geoff Barton commented on the IFS’s annual report on education funding in England, that states there has been no real-terms growth in the last 14 years

Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “The IFS has once again laid bare the government’s chronic underfunding of education. The extra money for schools and high needs announced in the Autumn Statement is obviously welcome, but it follows a decade of real-terms cuts, and, as the IFS points out, still represents 14 years without growth in school funding. This does not show a government that is ambitious for the future of children and young people.

“More stark still is the neglect of early years and post-16 education despite the vital importance of these sectors. The government’s investment in colleges and sixth forms has been woefully inadequate resulting in cuts to curriculum options and student support services. This financial squeeze and the effect on young people at a crucial point in their lives is the very opposite of levelling up.

“The impact of all these funding pressures has left an education workforce that is battered and demoralised. Their pay has been eroded in real-terms over the course of many years and their workload has increased because they have been asked to do more with less. As a result, we now have a full-blown recruitment and retention crisis which is leading to significant staff shortages in many schools and colleges.

“It will be impossible to sustain educational standards, let alone improve them, without making investment in education far more of a priority.”