Schools face a “large squeeze” on their resources despite the uplift in government funding awarded at last month’s budget, a report claims.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies’ annual report on education spending says that the £4.6 billion extra money allocated to schools in England over two years will help “meet the challenge of faster rises in costs”.
However, it warned that with no net growth in spending per pupil over 14 years, there has been “a historically large squeeze on school resources”.
The report says that school spending per pupil is expected to grow by 7 per cent in real terms between 2022-23 and 2024-25, taking it to 3 per cent more than its most recent high point in 2010.
But the report adds that accounting for “schools-specific cost inflation”, the expected real-terms growth rate is lower, at 5 per cent, meaning spending will just reach 2010 levels by 2024-25.
And it concludes: “That being said, no real-terms growth in school spending per pupil over a 14-year period still represents a significant squeeze on school resources. The only near precedent is the lack of real-terms growth in secondary school spending per pupil over the 1990s.”
Restoring school spending to 2010 levels was a pledge made by current prime minister Rishi Sunak when he was chancellor, and previous work by the IFS before the Autumn Statement had suggested the target would be missed.
The authors of the new report say that expected declining pupil numbers through to 2030 could lessen the pressure on schools but only if they “are able to shrink their costs and staff numbers in an equal measure”.
The report’s authors also address other areas of education spending, noting that colleges and sixth forms are in “a much worse position” than schools after receiving no additional funding in the Autumn Statement.
Geoff Barton, general secretary at the Association of School and College Leaders, said the report had “laid bare the government’s chronic underfunding of education”.
“The extra money for schools and high needs announced in the Autumn Statement is obviously welcome but it follows a decade of real-terms cuts and, as the IFS points out, still represents 14 years without growth in school funding. This does not show a government that is ambitious for the future of children and young people,” he added.
“More stark still is the neglect of early years and post-16 education despite the vital importance of these sectors. The government’s investment in colleges and sixth forms has been woefully inadequate, resulting in cuts to curriculum options and student support services”.
Tes revealed earlier this month that school sixth forms could face closure after being left out of the funding boost awarded in the Autumn Statement.
The Department for Education was contacted for comment.
