A group of parents and children campaigning against the government’s swingeing cuts to school funding will descend on Westminster tomorrow in a bid to rally support from lawmakers.
Primary and secondary pupils from across England will sing, make speeches and present artworks about the problems in their schools in Parliament to highlight how budget shortfalls are affecting their area.
Labour shadow chancellor John McDonnell, Lib Dem education spokesperson Layla Moran, and Green Party MP Caroline Lucas are among the cross-party panel hosting the event, where parents will push for them to sign a pledge to lobby for more funding for schools.
Among the stories MPs will hear tomorrow will be eight-year-old Eliana, who will tell of how she and her friends “cried our eyes out” when their school was forced to let go 11 members of staff in July.
“Should any teacher call in sick, we have to be moved to other classes where we are just given worksheets to keep us occupied for the whole day,” she will say. “Our teachers are over-stretched. Some of my friends have had to leave the school and I miss them.”
Indie, 12, will describe how her 1950s school buildings are literally coming apart at the seams, with panels falling off outside walls and leaks when it rains.
“We have very little outside space, and we can’t even use some of that because we can’t afford to make it useable. It’s so crowded we’re not allowed to run around at break or lunch, we get a red card and detention,” she will say.
Michael, 10, from Greenwich, will also highlight how funding shortfalls are impacting children with special educational needs and disability (SEND).
The government is already facing a wave of legal challenges to its plans to cut SEND funding, which 90 per cent of heads surveyed by the NAHT headteachers’ union said is getting increasingly difficult to source.
“I have special educational needs and I am being failed now in my education because there is not enough money available,” he will tell MPs.
“I am autistic and doubly exceptional. I am very worried about what is happening in our schools and how the lack of funding is affecting me and other children.
“I was out of school for 10 months during the most important year of my education due to being bullied in school. I need you to hear me and help me and the other children who are being affected by lack of staff and resources.”
Tomorrow’s event comes just two days after the Department for Education was publicly rebuked by the UK’s statistics watchdog for using misleading figures to defend its record on school funding and pupil performance.
While the DfE has repeatedly argued it is spending record amounts on UK schools, analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies found that funding per pupil has in fact fallen by 8 per cent between 2010 and 2018.
More than 2,000 headteachers marched on Downing Street late last month to protest against the cuts.
“Recent claims on spending and on quality of education from the Department for Education are deliberately misleading,” said Alison Ali, co-founder of the SOS campaign in Brighton & Hove.
“As other state services crumble, schools are expected to do more, with more pupils; yet they’re being given less money, and have fewer teachers. A nine-year-old can see the figures don’t add up.”
