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Parents urged to campaign against planned cuts in school funding

London schools are facing cuts in funding: Matt Cardy/Getty Images
London schools are facing cuts in funding: Matt Cardy/Getty Images

Thousands of parents were today urged to join a revolt against school funding cuts in London.

Hammersmith & Fulham council leader Stephen Cowan issued the appeal for parents to pile pressure on the Government to reconsider a controversial school financing shake-up.

A meeting to discuss the reforms at Hammersmith Town Hall tomorrow evening is expected to be attended by hundreds of parents, governors and teachers.

Labour councillor Mr Cowan said the Government is planning to slash £2.7 million over two years from funding for Hammersmith & Fulham schools which would “put children’s education at risk”. He added: “We want every parent to know about the Conservative Government’s planned cuts to their child’s education.

“The only way to stand any chance of changing the Government’s mind is if we send a united message that we want these cuts to be reversed.”

The town hall is urging parents to respond to the Government consultation on the reforms to call on Education Secretary Justine Greening, MP for Putney, to rethink the changes.

London Councils has warned that schools across the capital will lose up to £500 for every pupil.

The umbrella group stressed that the shake-up will lead to all boroughs missing out in a real-terms cut of £360 million in 2018-19, an average of £333 per pupil, with Inner London being the worst affected. At least 45 head teachers and principals in Hammersmith & Fulham have signed a letter warning of a “perfect storm” which they say means they will soon be forced to make “drastic decisions” that will significantly impact on young people’s education and lives.

But the Department for Education said that the Government had protected the core schools budget in real terms since 2010, so school funding was at its highest level on record at more than £40 billion in 2016-17.

It described the school funding system as “unfair, opaque and outdated” and so ministers are planning to end this “historic post code lottery”, with the changes meaning that more than half of England’s schools will receive a cash boost. A spokesman added: “London will remain the highest funded part of the country under our proposals, with inner London schools being allocated 30 per cent more funding per pupil than the national average.”

Two teaching groups urged Chancellor Philip Hammond to increase education spending to avoid staff cuts. In an open letter, the National Association of Head Teachers and the National Governors’ Association warned schools were being plunged into financial crises. They are facing the first real-terms cuts to funding since the mid-Nineties, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies.

Spending per pupil is set to fall by 6.5 per cent by 2019-20, it said. The DfE stressed that the IFS report highlighted that by 2020 per pupil spending in schools was set to be at least 70 per cent higher in real terms than in 1990.