Chancellor's budget cash handout to school heads is not new money

Gordon Brown's apparent budget hand out of extra money for school heads is another example of the same money being recycled in a different guise. In the budget Mr. Brown announced that a typical primary school of 250 pupils would receive a direct payment of £55,000 and a 1000 pupil secondary school could expect a cheque for £180,000. An e-mail from the Department of Education and Skills received by Kingsbridge Community College recently confirmed that this is not new money. These payments are nothing more than a combination of the existing School Standards Fund and the Devolved Formula Capital Grant that were previously announced.

Commenting on yet another instance of Government financial manipulation Totnes Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Spokesperson, Mike Treleaven, said:

' This is yet another instance of a Government announcement that does not live up to its promise. When Gordon Brown made his announcement in the budget schools immediately thought that additional, desperately needed, money would be devolved directly to school heads. Unfortunately this does not seem to be the case. All to often we have seen these promises of extra money turn out to be nothing more than old money wrapped up in new clothes. This seems to be another classic example.'

Mike Treleaven continued:

' From my long experience as a school governor I know the complicated way in which the Government continues to fund schools. There are special grants for this, special grants for that and complicated rules for where money can be spent and where it cannot. If this direct payment goes someway to simplifying this then I welcome it, but let's not pretend it is additional money being given to each school - it comes from the same pot. And, of course, this is a pot that continues to place schools in South Devon at a huge disadvantage by funding them at a consistently lower level than in other parts of the country.'