Education Funding in London

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Wednesday 4th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

I begin by thanking the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) for helping to secure the debate and for his excellent speech, which managed to define all the issues. It was a shame that the only other speech from the Government Benches was that of the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Graham Stuart). I cannot be as rude about his speech as I would like because he has left the Chamber, so I will limit myself to saying that he purported to be talking about fairness while, in fact, thanks to the sleuthing work of my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms), we found that he had not only a special interest but special access to the F40 group, which he leads. The long and the short of it is that this is about taking money away from very deprived areas and areas with high levels of need. I am not going to attack any other local authority and say that they do not have a need for education funding, but I resent people coming to the House under the guise of fairness saying that schools in my constituency, which are struggling, should lose a substantial proportion of their funds.

Let me begin by reading a short email I received a couple of weeks ago from a headteacher. I will not say from which school, although I think it will become clear as I read it out. It is a small, voluntary-aided, outstanding school. The email reads:

“Dear Andy, I would like to alert you to a meeting I will be hosting tonight and tomorrow morning for parents. I will be talking about the proposed cuts to our budget next year if the new national funding formula, which is out for consultation, gets the go ahead. It is likely that our school will suffer a 10% decrease in our budget, this coupled with a 9% decrease this year will leave us financially unviable. I recognise that this is very short notice, but if you happen to be available either tonight at 6 pm, or tomorrow at 9.30 am, I think that both myself and our parents would appreciate your input.”

I managed to get along the next morning and found a substantial number of parents who wanted to talk about a number of issues, including the consultation. They were extremely well-informed. They wanted, first, to talk about places planning and the fact that we have in the borough some new free schools that are half empty while other community schools are oversubscribed. They particularly wanted to talk about the new policy of forced academisation and the problems that have occurred through that. These are not subjects that I raised during the meeting, but subjects that the parents raised and ideas they unanimously opposed.

The parents, and certainly the teachers, wanted to talk about recruitment. Any headteachers to whom I have spoken in my borough say that they are facing real problems in that regard. It is ridiculous, in terms of both need and demand, to compare London with other parts of the country, such as Cambridgeshire, as has happened. The average price of a property in my constituency is knocking £1 million. The Labour council, when it was elected, converted some of the luxury flats that the previous Conservative administration were building into key worker flats specifically for teachers, and it managed to retain some teachers as a consequence. For most teachers, it is impossible to afford to live in those boroughs, even on a good salary.

The email I quoted talked about ongoing cuts. The Government would have us believe that there are no ongoing cuts, but of course there are. Spending on education is frozen and schools are facing rising costs from pension contributions, national insurance contributions and teachers’ pay rises. These costs, before any changes to the funding formula, mean a total of £3 million of real-terms cuts to school budgets in the borough, which is the equivalent of 61 teachers. That has to be found for this financial year before any of the other changes come on stream.

Let us also remember what we are losing. This has already been mentioned, but London schools are doing brilliantly compared with what happened under previous Conservative Governments. In 2002, the percentage of pupils getting five A* to C grades at GCSE was 35%, and by 2013 it had almost doubled to 64%. For disadvantaged pupils, it had more than doubled, from 23% to 49%. That is what we are putting at risk with these politically motivated changes.

What will happen if further cuts of some 10% happen? Fewer subjects will be offered to children. Cuts will be made, which are already being flagged up, to mentoring support and to support staff and, perhaps, to teaching staff. Enrichment activities such as music, sport and drama have already been cut, and, as Members heard from the email I read out, some teachers, particularly in small schools, wonder whether their schools will remain viable at all. On the whole, these are outstanding, or at least good, schools. That is all being put at risk.

We have talked about English as an additional language, and 49% of pupils in London speak English as an additional language. That is the case in very few parts of the country. We have talked about mobility. There are primary schools in my borough of Hammersmith and Fulham where, over the life-cycle of the school, more than half the children in a particular class will change, with all the consequences mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham and others. I do not think there is a single school in my borough, and probably not in London, that could say it had a bit of slack, that it had money to spare and that it could provide that money.

I fear that the changes are being discussed in a cynical way and that the Government are shroud-waving. We are talking about 10% cuts on average and perhaps up to 20% cuts in some cases. When the second part of the consultation comes out, the cuts will be only 8% or 15%, and we will be told that the Government have done us some favours along the way. They will not have done us any favours. If the term “fair funding” continues to be used, it must genuinely reflect the need.

I see the Minister nodding and I appreciate that. When he comes to respond, I hope he will specifically take account of the huge strides that London schools have made and that he will want to build on them. Given the economic stress affecting every aspect from teachers to school buildings, I hope he will realise that funding levels need to be maintained. We have talked about levelling up—it may be easy to say, but it needs to be done. Other schools around the country should have the same achievement levels as schools in London. We should be a beacon and an example to the rest of the country; we should not be punished for our success.