The schools will be given an extra pound;62 million over the next two years, following agreement by the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities to a new formula for distributing the cash, as revealed in The TES Scotland on November 4.

The latest episode in what has been a series of long-running attempts to break the link between poverty and low attainment will see authorities allocated pound;18 million from next April and pound;44 million for the 2007-08 financial year.

Peter Peacock, Education Minister, said: “We know that the broadly equal distribution of resources to councils for education has unequal results.

The effect of multiple deprivation on pupil attainment is stark.”

A row over the funding between cities and less urban areas was eventually resolved through Cosla. The agreement means that 80 per cent of the Executive’s grant to authorities will continue to be distributed on the normal population basis. But 18 per cent will henceforth go to the most deprived areas and 2 per cent will be earmarked for “supersparsity” to meet the higher costs of providing schools in remote areas.

The major winner is Glasgow, which will have an extra pound;9 million to spend on 5,200 teaching posts by 2007, out of the 53,985 teachers pledged by the Executive for that year.

Other councils to benefit will be North Lanarkshire (pound;4.6 million for 3,650 teaching posts), Edinburgh (pound;3.9 million for 3,600 teachers), Fife (pound;3.8 million for 4,300 teachers) and South Lanarkshire (pound;3.8 million for 3,150 teachers).

The Executive has been unable to provide comparisons of how the allocation of posts, conveyed by letter to each of the local authorities this week, compares with present figures. But it will be left to each council to decide which schools should benefit.

Mr Peacock said: “Schools in (deprived) areas should be able to access new and additional teachers, allowing further class size reductions, home-school teachers and more intensive support for pupils in most need.”