Education should be top priority at election

AS an officer of the Leicestershire district of the National Education Union (NEU), I am writing to you to express our support for the recent letter from the Leicestershire Secondary Heads.

This has gone out to the parents of students at our county’s secondary schools highlighting the crisis in funding in schools in our county.

They have given the details of where the crisis in funding exists in their schools.

Their concerns are shared by all the education unions, and, as the heads have requested of their parents, we too in the NEU would urge all parents and others to ask questions about the crisis in education funding of their county councillors and their MPs, and indeed of any candidates canvassing at the forthcoming General Election.

Leicestershire school funding has for many years been at the bottom end of national funding.

More recently, we have seen the serious problem of unsafe buildings, the so-called Raac scandal.

But schools across the county can highlight other problems, such as leaking roofs, heating problems, and still some with asbestos, which should have been removed. The other crisis present in our schools, but also across the country, is that of the recruitment and retention of teachers and support staff.

As the letters highlight, in some subject areas such as maths and science, schools struggle to recruit.

And the government has not achieved over several years its targets for teacher recruitment, despite its offers of one-off extra grants.

The questions that parents and others should be asking of all candidates are why are there teacher and staff shortages across the country and here in our county?

Has it got something to do with issues around pay and workload?

One specific area of concern is that of cuts in special needs education funding.

We have seen both in our county and in the city of Leicester cuts in this area due to both authorities struggling with cuts to their budgets, arising from government funding cuts.

For example, those special educational needs pupils who are 16-plus and over have experienced or are about to experience cuts to their special transport and also support for their learning.

So in conclusion, as the letters say, and my union would endorse, especially in the forthcoming elections, it is time that education should be put at the top of the agenda for funding, especially in the forthcoming General Election.

It too often ends up at the bottom end. And it is the case that all our children, sadly, only have one chance at their education. Pauline Town, Leicestershire NEU former assistant district secretary