Schools Funding Crisis

The Government has still not done enough to stop serious problems with school budgets continuing next year, according to Folkestone MEP Chris Huhne.

Commenting on the Guardian's survey of the school balances, which found that many Kent schools were setting deficit budgets to deal with cash shortages, Mr Huhne said that the Government needed to do more.

The survey found that schools avoided making an unusual number of staff redundant by running up deficits. But those deficits will simply mean deeper cuts in future years unless the Government or the county council comes up with more cash.

The Government have announced a rise in spending for the coming two years, but it will be barely enough to cover future rises in costs. The underlying deficits remain and that means cuts one way or another.

"It is extraordinary that the Government has got its spending into such a mess when the Prime Minister himself said that his priority in government was 'education, education and education," said Mr Huhne.

"Planned improvements in teachers and classroom assistants and the introduction of the new 14 to 19 curriculum are bound to be delayed as schools revert back to larger classes and a more restrictive curriculum."

"The schools cash crisis is another example, along with the botched introduction of family tax credit, of the Government failing to devote the attention to detail that is necessary to make its policies work," said Mr Huhne.