Sir Kevan Collins, the government’s former education recovery commissioner, has described the government’s latest funding announcement as ‘meagre’ and called it a ‘false economy’.

Sir Kevan resigned in June this year after his recommendation for a £15 billion coronavirus recovery package was rejected by the government in favour of an investment of just £1.4 billion. In his budget on Wednesday 27 October, chancellor of the exchequer Rishi Sunak announced that a further £1.8 billion would be invested in education recovery over the next three years. Mr Sunak said this latest additional money would take the total amount of funding to assist with educational recovery from the pandemic to nearly £5 billion – a figure which includes both the national tutoring programme (NTP) and funding allocated directly to schools. The additional money announced appears to be focused chiefly on secondary schools, with Treasury documents stating that primary schools will continue to get an additional £145 per eligible pupil, but funding for secondary schools will be doubled.

Writing about the new funding in The Times, Sir Kevan said ‘It’s great to see additional money – always – in education, but it’s not enough’, adding, ‘I’m concerned that these meagre measures reveal a failure to recognise the kind of foundational role schools play in creating fair and prosperous communities. We know the pandemic and learning loss has hit our poorest communities hardest.’ He added that the ‘short-term savings’ offered by a more limited recovery programme would be ‘dwarfed by the long-term cost of successive cohorts leaving education with lower skills, an effect that will be most apparent in our poorest communities’. This approach represented a ’false economy and a step towards a less equal society’ Sir Kevan suggested.

In his budget speech to MPs Mr Sunak said the new money, coupled with spending increases announced in 2019, would ‘restore per-pupil funding to 2010 levels in real terms’. However analysis from the Institute for Fiscal Studies found that the increase in education spending was lower than for other departments – funding for the Department for Education (DfE) will rise by 2.2 per cent in real terms, whereas the average increase across government as whole is 3.3 per cent.

Reaction from education sector unions to the budget was generally not enthusiastic. Deborah Lawson, assistant general secretary with Community Union’s Voice Community education and early years section, referenced the suggestion that funding would return to 2010 levels as she said ‘Trying to turn the clock back to 2010 does not take into account the years of cuts and austerity and the ravages of the pandemic that have happened since then.  What is needed is a detailed, comprehensive and ambitious recovery plan, not back to the future economics.’

The DfE said in a statement that the additional investment in the budget means every school and college will have extra dedicated funding to support those ‘who most need help catching up’. Education secretary Nadhim Zahawi commented: ‘The pandemic has taken precious time in young people’s lives, including the vital learning they need to reach their potential. Today’s investment will enhance the recovery we know is already underway for young people, building on the real impact of the steps we’ve taken so far – whether that’s tutoring, world class teacher training or summer schools. We have been and we will continue to be ambitious about the futures of our children and young people.’