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The Department for Education has apologised to headteachers and local authorities in England after an administrative error left schools with less money per pupil than they had been promised for next year.
The mistake occurred when the department underestimated the number of pupils when it was working on the £59.6bn schools budget for 2024-25.
The subsequent revision will leave primary and secondary schools with £45 and £55 less per pupil, respectively, than they had originally been promised when the national funding formula was published in July. The NFF is the way the government determines how core education funding is allocated in England.
In a written statement on Monday, Nick Gibb, schools minister, said he was sorry for the inconvenience caused. “I recognise that the correction of the NFF error will be difficult for local authorities and frustrating for some school leaders,” he said.
His apology came after the department’s top civil servant wrote to the House of Commons education select committee earlier this month to confess to the “error processing forecast pupil numbers”.
Susan Acland-Hood, the permanent secretary, apologised for the mistake, adding the department had launched a formal review to establish why the errors were not picked up. “Improvements have already been identified to ensure similar mistakes are not repeated in the future,” she wrote.
The general secretaries of all four main teaching unions — the NEU, ASCL, NAHT and NASUWT — wrote to Gibb last week calling on the government to honour its original commitments in the July funding formula.
They complained that the recalculation would effectively reduce the expected funding to schools by £370mn. “Schools are already having difficulty balancing their books; some will now face the very real prospect of cuts to provision,” they added.
But in a reply to the unions, Gibb said there would be no extra money. “This is the highest ever level of school funding in our history in real terms. Within this total we will deliver an average 1.9 per cent increase in funding per pupil in 2024-25.”
The government said the recalculation meant average funding per primary and secondary school pupil would drop to £5,300 and £6,830, respectively, next year. Although this represented an increase of £100 and £110 respectively from this year, unions said inflation meant schools were struggling to balance their books.
“It is symptomatic of a department in chaos, that it should have to refer itself for formal review,” Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the NEU, said on Monday. He called on Gibb to reconsider his decision not to reinstate the funding promised under the original funding formula.
The opposition Labour party said the National Audit Office, the spending watchdog, should carry out a review, which would have to be ordered by ministers. The government has not so far responded to the request.
Shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson said that primary schools would be more than £12,000 worse off in the next academic year and an average secondary school more than £57,000 down as a result of the revision.
She has written to the cabinet secretary Simon Case to ask whether the admission of the mistake by Acland-Hood was delayed to avoid political embarrassment.
“Coming just days after the conclusion of the Conservative party conference I hope you will be able to provide assurance that the communication of this error was not delayed,” she said.
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