Council Plea For Urgent Extra Funding For East Riding Schools

East Riding of Yorkshire Council is making a plea to the new Education Secretary for urgent extra funding for East Riding schools.

The council Leader, Councillor Stephen Parnaby OBE, and Councillor Julie Abraham, portfolio holder for children, young people and education, have written to Justine Greening MP expressing concern that a new national funding formula for schools has been delayed for a further year.

It is hoped that the new formula will benefit East Riding schools, which are currently the lowest funded per pupil in the country.

However, the council is urging Ms Greening to make additional interim funding available in 2017/18, to ease pressure on schools until the funding reforms are introduced in 2018/19.

It is warning that East Riding schools are forecasting to overspend by £5million in 2017/18 and that many – including nine of its 11 maintained secondary schools – are facing a deficit budget unless ‘significant action’ is taken in the meantime.

In their letter, Councillors Parnaby and Abraham say that schools have already made significant savings but they need extra help to protect the impact on pupils and to avoid making unnecessary staff cuts ahead of the expected funding reforms

The letter says:

“Schools in the East Riding of Yorkshire are forecasting to overspend in 2017/18 by £5million. Pressures facing schools are well documented and include increases in national insurance and pension contributions, as well as pay awards, the living wage and apprenticeship levy.

“As a result of these pressures, the level of school balances in the East Riding is likely to reduce significantly, with many schools now finding themselves with budget deficits.

“Many schools have already made significant savings and are continuing in their search for further savings and it is now difficult to see how further savings can be achieved without it affecting the outcomes of pupils.”

In 2015/16, the Department for Education allocated an additional £390million to those authorities below the minimum funding level. This included the East Riding, which received an additional £1.5million to bring it up to minimum funding level.

This was an interim measure pending the introduction of the national funding formula, which has now been delayed. The cost pressures facing East Riding schools have already far exceeded the extra funding they received, with the increase in employers’ national insurance costs alone costing East Riding schools an extra £2.437million.

In their letter, Councillors Parnaby and Abraham say schools will be making staffing decisions at the end of 2016 for the start of the next academic year, and a Government commitment to give extra funding as an interim measure now would help avoid any unnecessary staffing reductions before the national funding formula is introduced.

They suggest that funding for this could be found from the extra £500million announced by the Chancellor last autumn for the introduction of fair funding.

Councillor Abraham said:

“An invitation has been extended to the Secretary of State to come to the East Riding to see the work that is going on in East Riding schools.

“Our schools are really stepping up to the mark in spite of funding levels and have recorded excellent outcomes this summer, including our best ever A-level and GCSE results. It is important that we protect their ability to maintain that high standard.”