The Association of School and College Leaders
(ASCL) has today (Wednesday 22 March 2017) submitted
its response to the
government’s consultation on the proposed national funding
formula (NFF) for schools. The key points are:
· ASCL
has been campaigning for a national distribution formula for over
two decades and we welcome these proposals in principle.
· A
failure to follow through on developing a national funding
formula will mean the current inequities of the system will be
perpetuated.
· The
proposed NFF redistributes funding but does not address the
insufficiency that currently exists in the level of investment in
the education sector.
· Our
modelling indicates that the basic levels of funding proposed in
the NFF are therefore too low and that many schools will fail
financially.
· Schools
will have to use any funding they receive as a result of
deprivation, English as an Additional Language, and other
additionality factors, to subsidise basic educational provision
rather than provide targeted support to pupils.
· Schools
with low levels of deprivation will almost certainly have
insufficient funding to use to do this, and many will become
insolvent.
· We
would urge the government to work with ASCL and others to
determine a minimum funding level for all schools.
ASCL Interim General Secretary Malcolm Trobe
said: “The Department for Education is right to develop a funding
formula for schools. Under the current system, the government
allocates vastly different amounts of funding per pupil to
different areas of England and 151 local authorities then apply
their own formulae. This highly complex system creates serious
inconsistencies in the level of funding received by similar
schools with similar intakes in different areas of the country.
It is a postcode lottery and has to be addressed.
“Successive governments have put this issue in
the ‘too-difficult’ drawer for too long and the current
government is to be congratulated on its commitment to the
introduction of a funding formula which aims to address the
manifest unfairness of the current system. The big problem for
the Department for Education is that it is doing so at a time of
serious government underfunding in education. A funding formula
addresses how money is distributed, not whether there is enough
in the first place. The result is that the levels of funding
proposed in the formula are too low and our modelling suggests
that many schools will fail financially.
“However, it is essential that we press ahead
with the development of a formula and that we make it work. Even
if the resulting formula is imperfect we will at least have a
model which we can work to improve. The worst possible outcome
would be that the formula is put back in the ‘too-difficult
drawer’ and we end up stuck with the unfairness and inconsistency
of the current funding system for another 30 years. The
underfunding of the education system is a critical issue with or
without the formula, and in either scenario schools will fail
financially unless more money is invested in the system as a
matter of urgency.
“The solution to this potentially disastrous
situation is that the Treasury must reassess its spending plans
and allocate enough money to ensure that all schools are able to
provide the education that pupils need and deserve. Schools must
be properly resourced if they are to continue to raise standards
and deliver a world-class education for every child.”
