Borough Schools Under Funding

9.59.00am GMT Tue 14th Dec 2004

The latest Government figures demonstrate the large funding gap between inner city and outer London boroughs, including Richmond. Richmond has the fourth lowest per pupil funding of London boroughs in both secondary and primary with, respectively, £3,479 and £2,663 as against £5,051 and £4,155 for Tower Hamlets (Sutton and Kingston are virtually identical to Richmond and Bromley, Bexley and Havering get less).

Vincent Cable MP said that "the borough's primary schools do a truly remarkable job when we consider that per capita funding is roughly half the level in a private, non boarding, prep school. The differential in the secondary sector is even bigger.

"The inner city schools do have genuinely greater need but I wonder if the balance is right. What is certainly wrong is that when there is a lot of cross border movement of pupils, as in the secondary sector, the borough is not properly compensated for the cost of out of borough pupils. The Government's estimates show that Hounslow's secondary pupils cost 10% more to educate than Richmond pupils, Wandsworth's 25% more, but Richmond is not paid any more to educate those coming into our borough to be educated. And in the secondary schools, they account for perhaps 40% of the pupil intake."