Labour's plan to cut £2bn from schools
- 00:01:23
- ITN
Labour's plan to cut £2bn from schools
The Children's Secretary, Ed Balls, has revealed that over £2 billion will be cut from the schools budget as part of a huge recession-fuelled cost-cutting drive. The move means Mr Balls has become the first cabinet minister to set out how the cuts, that Gordon Brown this week conceded were necessary, would affect public services. Up to 3,000 senior school staff, including heads and deputies as well as bureaucrats, could be axed as schools are merged into "federations" run by a single team, Mr Balls told The Sunday Times. However, he suggested that most of those posts could be lost by "natural wastage". The Children's Secretary also warned teachers that they would have to accept pay restraint and said more money could be saved by scrapping the 300-strong "field forces" of Whitehall officials that advise schools on the curriculum. "It is going to be tougher on spending over the next few years," said Mr Balls of the post-2011 squeeze, which will see up to 5 per cent taken off school spending. "If we are going to keep teachers and teaching assistants on the front line, that means we are going to have to be disciplined on public sector pay, including in education," he added. Outlining the plans for more joint working between schools, he said: "You might have a head teacher and a team of deputy heads working across the different schools. "But we are not going to have larger class sizes."
ITN | September 20, 2009
