Dr Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said: “The NFER report has confirmed what the education world already knew.
“Schools are struggling to cope with the extra costs of COVID-19. Extra money is being spent on cleaning costs, school layouts and extra heating, meanwhile schools are losing out on lettings income.
“It is unsurprising that schools in deprived areas are suffering most. The introduction of minimum per pupil funding levels mean money is being directed to better off areas irrespective of need.
“The government has announced a COVID-19 Workforce Fund to cover extra costs. However, it only covers 1 November to the end of the Christmas term and schools with reserves are not eligible. The COVID-19 crisis is set to continue until at least the end of the Easter term, and probably the rest of the academic year, so schools will be back in the same position from the start of the new year.”
Commenting on the report, Geoff Barton, general Secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said:
“The fact that deprived schools are under the greatest financial pressure as a result of the COVID pandemic is a damning indictment of the government’s failure to provide the support that is so desperately needed.
“Its recent announcement of a COVID workforce fund to support the cost of covering teacher absence is very limited and comes with far too many caveats.
“Schools and colleges are incurring huge costs in managing COVID safety measures as well as paying for supply cover and they need these costs to be fully reimbursed.
“Their budgets were already extremely tight before the pandemic and they simply cannot sustain this additional pressure.
“The inevitable outcome will be that schools and colleges will have to make further cuts which will affect provision for their pupils unless the government gets a grip of this situation.”
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