Schools facing catastrophic winter

[noblegiraffe]

Schools are starting their Autumn term facing an unprecedented funding crisis. Headteachers are becoming increasingly frantic in their disbelief that the government has done fuck all about it, and appears to be planning to continue to do fuck all about it.

There are few issues contributing -

The energy crisis - school energy bills are not capped, unlike household ones. To give an idea of the scale of the issue, Ormiston Academies Trust which sponsors 43 schools will see its energy bills rise from £5.1 million to £14.3 million. Grant Shapps, transport minister, says that schools could consider switching to LED lightbulbs.

Teacher and support staff payrises - the government have recommended payrises for teachers and support staff, but crucially will not be giving schools extra money to fund them. If schools give staff the recommended pay rise, they will have to cut services to fund this (even before you consider the energy bills)

The cost of living crisis - schools are facing increased prices just as households are. Food for the canteen, stationery orders, everything is more expensive. Sam Freedman tweets "Very rough calculation is that energy bills plus teacher pay increase plus higher food costs are going to add around £5bn to school budgets nationally. Just under 10% of the total budget. And none of it was built into the funding model."

On top of that, covid still needs to be considered. Last Jan/Feb schools were in chaos due to staff absences (the government widely trumpeted their call for an army of volunteers to step in, which didn't appear). At the end of the summer term, all the education unions wrote to James Cleverly, temp Ed Sec asking for a covid plan that included increased funding to schools for supply teachers to cover staff absence. Given that we haven't actually got a functioning government at the moment, I'm pretty sure he hasn't replied. Signs are that we're facing a bad flu season too, vaccinating school staff should be a consideration. Some schools already pay for the flu jab for staff, most won't be eligible for a covid booster, no idea what the impact of that will be. Obviously there will be pressure to close windows to keep any heat in, which goes against covid guidance for ventilation.

Some academy trusts appear to have large reserves which will help them weather the storm, most very much don't. twitter.com/ajjolley/status/1564562763443277825?s=21&t=nmM2Q_vFCmo5GzILNNKhfg

School leaders are reporting that they will have to make support staff and/or teachers redundant or pause recruitment, restrict heating, cancel school trips and extra curricular activities. This will inevitably have an impact on children, and on the quality of education on offer.

I'm not sure what either Truss or Sunak have said about the crisis facing education, all I've heard is wittering about grammar schools. An intervention is needed urgently.

www.tes.com/magazine/news/general/energy-bills-cost-of-living-crisis-schools-face-catastrophic-winter

Wholesale price controls have to happen surely? I agree that this has to be fixed, the energy market is in massive failure at this point.

Remember that water prices are due to go up due to very little in the way of repairs/replacements being done and the money being given to shareholders.

Excellent post.

And important to also remember the tax cuts won't actually benefit those who most need it personally either.

Those who don't work, earn very low incomes and especially the disabled will see no increase in personal income from a tax cut.

But they still need to increase funding to schools and I'm sure if they did this it would be a vote winner.

Yet they don't.

Because as you said it doesn't reach their Tory voters.

Tory members that should say.

I reckon if they increased finding to schools they'd gain voters.

Firstly it is only the oil and gas companies or energy producers such as BP, She'll, QGPC, Equinor, Statkraft etc that are making profits. The energy suppliers such as OVO or British Gas supply are barely making any profit or even a loss.

Secondly the biggest investors in renewable energy right now are the same energy producers. I mean with current energy prices why wouldn't they reinvest their profits into renewable energy. Whatever you windfall tax them means less investment into renewable energy.

Thirdly how exactly are you going to pay for the nationalisation of the energy producers without incurring further national debt. Unless you are proposing going full Venezuelan forcible nationalisation without any compensation to shareholders which is really not a good idea.

So on UK gas supplies roughly 50% is produced in the UK, a third from Norway and the rest from LNG from Qatar, Algeria etc

Now theoretically you could price control the price of gas produced in the UK although the producers will simply chose to export it to Europe for a higher price . You also can't price control imported gas from day Norway or Qatar as they will simply chose to sell it to Germany or Asia.

I wasn't suggesting it was the one save all ans finished solution: I'm aware I was being overly simplistic. I'm also not just advocating taking steps to nationalise suppliers alone.

However, with regards to a windfall tax, major energy companies have already stated it wouldn't affect their investment intentions. If they were nationalised, we'd have even greater control of investment in future, renewable technologies. Let's be honest, the free market isn't going to produce (or release) the results we need until it's financially better for them than the current situation.

We are going to continue to incur further national debt regardless. A country's debt, and increasing it, is only an issue when it's done to fund things that won't generate more money in the economy (like tax cuts for the rich or funnelling money into donor pockets for unfulfilled PPE contracts). Incurring debt to provide the country with the ability to control it's own energy (generation and supply) would not only improve things for the general public but, when done right, will also provide a better revenue stream for the treasury that can then be used to better support public services like education.

Truss will sack them all soon anyway. 🤷‍♀️

Yeah @1dayatatime my dad was explaining this...so really this isn't about nationalising Scottish power et al, we'd have to nationalise energy producers like BP - is that possible?

What a mess - energy producers are multi-nats, so we need a multi national solution.

If we did nationalise Scottish power, eON etc it would only make it simpler to control prices passed onto the consumer not the purchase price.

Ugh.

@Iamnotthe1

"We are going to continue to incur further national debt regardless. A country's debt, and increasing it, is only an issue when it's done to fund things that won't generate more money in the economy (like tax cuts for the rich or funnelling money into donor pockets for unfulfilled PPE contracts). Incurring debt to provide the country with the ability to control it's own energy (generation and supply) would not only improve things for the general public but, when done right, will also provide a better revenue stream for the treasury that can then be used to better support public services like education."

++++

One of the problems of the teaching of economics in the UK today is the overwhelming focus on Keynesian theory. Keynes might have worked in the 1930s when you were starting from a very low level of Government debt. However today increasing Government debt simply increases the supply of money which in turn just increases inflation. More money chasing the same goods and services just increases their price.

You only have to look at inflation today after the Government increases debt by £450 billion on Covid measures. Equally any Government doesn't have a good track record on getting it "right" when it comes to spending tax payers money.

Keynes might have worked in the 1930s when you were starting from a very low level of Government debt

National debt was a higher percentage of GDP than it is now.

There is no perfect solution but continuing with the approach we have now will not bring us out of this situation, considering that the approach itself is part of what is causing it.

So what is your proposal, 1day? Let schools run up massive debts because they can't pay their bills?

Cut off their electricity?

Firstly from a pure economic and realpolitik perspective I see government spending on education as the best use of tax payers money and above all other expenditure in terms of investing in the future of the country and getting a return on tax payers money.

As I previously posted the electorate is always looking for easy answers both to Covid and the cost of living crisis. But harsh reality is now starting to bite.

In response to the current energy crisis there is a hard choice on throwing Ukraine under a bus and cutting a deal with Putin in Crimea , Donetsk and Luhansk in return for normal gas supplies or supporting the independence and democracy of Ukraine but paying more for energy. There are things that can be done around the edges like suspending renewable subsidies which are not needed in the current high price environment. But the real driver on prices is the Ukraine/ Russia situation.

On Government debt there are things that can de done around the edges like lowering the inheritance tax threshold as passed done wealth only reinforces social immobilty. Also there are a few other loopholes that need to be plugged. But to make any significant dent in the debt we need to look at cuts to Government spending which is never going to be a vote winner.

And if I was to cut any Government spending then I would go for the biggest spend first which is state pensions. By increasing the pension age by three months every year you would make a significant impact on government spending. You could also argue that it is morally wrong for an entire generation of young people to have sacrificed their futures on Covid measures and it's financial cost which largely benefitted the life expectancy and f the over 75s.

Of course none of the above is a vote winner so heart breakingly schools will get cold, teachers will despair and the poorer children will suffer the most.

The boss of the oasis trust gave a brilliant interview on GMB this morning.

He was firm and passionate and absolutely steadfast that he will not allow childrens education to suffer.

Yet another new Education Secretary, how will this one fare?

Hard to know as he doesn't seem to have any actual opinions on education.

Is it Kit? He’s my MP, his opinion is the one he’s been told to have. I’ve written to him a few times and response is always to quote government policy.

4th Ed Sec in 2 months, and 6 weeks of that were summer holidays!

He went to a fancy private school so they've stopped even bothering trying to get ones with any experience of state education.

Their only qualification for being Education Secretary seems to be that they went to school

He’s in a super safe seat, so not bothered about being popular or engaging, can’t imagine he’ll be much of an advocate for sufficient funding. He must be aware of significant recruitment challenges because Hampshire has a particularly difficult situation, close to Surrey where they have outer London weighting and school 6th forms. We have neither, but are just on commuter belt with high house prices.

But his priority will absolutely be his future career prospects with the Conservative party.

Oh so true about not bothering, but not bothering about our schools, our children at all in the state system.

I don't know which private school the education secretary went to but seeing Lambrook on BBC news, the new school of the royal children and thinking of the typical state school, the contrast cannot be more stark.

This isn't about the royal children but about the system where our government are running our publically, tax funded schools into the ground whilst those with money can choose something else for their children.

Lambrook, says the BBC commentator over a drone clip - “ has a nine hole golf course, tennis courts, farm animals to look after”
ffs whilst it is acceptable for our children to be in schools with inadequate staffing ratios, staffing that doesn't meet children’s needs and cold, because our school’s are being starved of cash.

Protect, protest, protest, for your children’s education.

It’s super sad isn’t it. My daughter last year was using a window sill as a desk under an open window which was freezing, because there weren’t enough desks in that particular classroom. She’s had 7 English teachers in 3 years and tells me the best but about maths is the 10 minutes before a particularly disruptive student is removed as he is entertaining but clearly wasting masses of teaching time. This at an ‘outstanding’ state secondary. I imagine the new Ed Sec has visited my dd school as it’s in his constituency, but I doubt been shown what dd sees.

I’ve posted before under different user names. I’m a governor and this week had a meeting about the budget as the situation has worsened (significantly) than when it was approved.

Bottom line - the budget has been cut all it can already so next year classes with be merged and 2 teachers made redundant (or not backfilled if they leave). Likely to also lose a TA. That excludes the fact some of building is in urgent need of repair.

I emailed my MP yesterday as am disgusted by the situation. If Truss is all about economic growth, we need exceptionally well educated children to innovate and compete internationally to deliver that. Cutting education budgets is not how you achieve growth.

If I were Truss I honestly don’t know which I’d prioritise first - NHS, Energy, Education or Inflation and that’s just the top 4.