This week, Parliament held its 'Estimates Day' debates, an opportunity for MPs to scrutinise government departmental spending – including Education, writes East Hampshire MP Damian Hinds. I raised the several extra cost pressures that are being put on schools, and argued that we are now at a point where a new school funding formula is needed, in recognition of demographic change. In Hampshire, school-age pupil numbers have been steadily rising since 2015. That year, around 187,400 children were enrolled in schools across the county. By last year, that figure had grown to nearly 200,000. This was a trend that reflected the national picture, with total pupil numbers in England reaching nearly 9 million by the 2023/24 academic year.
00:00Because when pupil numbers are rising, if you hold real terms per pupil funding constant, that is a net increase in resourcing to the school.
00:10When they're falling, even if you increase real terms per pupil by a few percent, that feels very much like a cut.
00:20If you think about it in real practical terms, if you've got a primary school class of 27, and the numbers then go up to 29, that is an increase in revenue to you as the school of something like £10,000, £11,000, £12,000.
00:36But the vast majority of your costs don't change.
00:40It works the same way in reverse.
00:42If you move from 29 pupils to 27, you lose £10,000 to £12,000.
00:48But, of course, you're still having the same cost.
00:51You're still paying the teacher the same, and so on.
00:54In a big secondary school, you might reduce, say, from an eighth-form entry to a sixth-form entry and manage the numbers that way.
01:00But in a rural primary school, neither of those things is an option.
01:04You have major, major indivisibilities.
01:08And right now, 92% of DfE funding for schools is driven by pupil numbers.
01:15And I just don't think that is going to work over the years ahead.
01:17So I ask ministers, what are they going to do to reform funding so it is fair and effective at a time of falling over all pupil numbers?
