Steve Besley's Education Eye: week ending 02 August 2024

Education Eye will appear briefly over the summer break as news dictates. 

A grim start to the summer break.

Away from the unspeakable tragedy at a children’s event, much of the news this week has focused on the state of the public finances, just how bad they actually were or are, and who’s most responsible for the £22bn black hole that’s been revealed.

The Chancellor set out her perspective in a Statement to MPs at the start of the week, with further details in an accompanying audit of unfunded pledges speedily conducted by the Treasury.

“This is not the statement I wanted to give today,” she said “and these are not the decisions I wanted to make. But they are the right decisions in difficult circumstances.”

It was all presented, as many commentators noted, in a suitably school teacherish, finger-wagging way.” A superb disappointed headteacher act,” the description from the Independent’s John Rentoul.

Broadly those ‘difficult’ decisions involved scrapping a number of ‘commitments made by the previous government that were unfunded,’ by applying the now adopted sniff test of ‘If we can’t afford it, we cannot do it.’

So out went Rishi’s Advanced British Standard qualification and the Rwanda scheme and Boris’s hospital building programme along with measures on social care and the winter fuel payments, among others.

The aim, as the Chancellor explained, was ‘to reduce the pressure on the public finances by £5.5bn this year and over £8bn next year.’

Pay awards for teachers among others were endorsed but departments would have to find ‘2% savings in their back-office costs by the autumn Budget.’ 

And talking of the Budget, which was confirmed for October 30, the Chancellor went on to announce a number of other measures to tighten things up.

These included setting three-year budgets for depts with the latest multi-year Spending Review formally launched and completing next spring, the creation of a new Office of Value for Money and closer working with the Office for Budget Responsibility.

“It will take time,” she concluded. “It won’t happen overnight” but it will ‘fix the foundations.’ At least the sun’s shining.

Debate will continue over the coming months about the figures, about who’s to blame, about the impact of the measures and about where to find efficiencies. As Paul Johnson of the IfS said ‘Rachel Reeves is within her rights to feel somewhat aggrieved… but not all of what we heard should have come as a great surprise.’

For education, perhaps four things stand out.

First, while the Budget on October 30 will obviously be important, it’s worth noting longer term the remit provided for the major Spending Review. This is because it offers an insight into how the government is expecting depts like education to operate in future given the current tight financial circumstances.

Here’s the text. “The government will use the Spending Review to change the way public services are delivered by embedding a mission-led approach, driving forward public service reform and making the best use of technology to better deliver services.” So lots of reviews, encouraging flexible working for teachers rather than major reforms, that sort of thing, a focus on opportunity as the big mission and plenty of references to the power of technology.

Second, making efficiencies will be hard in the short term as the dept will still be running for a while on its current budget, set in 2021 before inflation hit. The Treasury forecast the impact of inflation at 15% over the three years. That wasn’t in the 2021 calculations.

Scrapping the Advanced British Standard will save £185m next year. Helpful, but it also means the commitment to extra hours for 16+ study programmes would go as well. In other words, efficiency savings often have knock-on effects elsewhere.

Third, on the pay award, “equivalent to an increase of over £2,500 for the average teacher” as the document explained, it seems likely that the dept will have to absorb some of the costs. So where does it leave things for future settlements?

The NEU, for instance, described the award as “a necessary first step in reversing the real terms cuts inflicted upon the profession over the last 14 years.” Junior doctors are already considering their next steps. What then about teachers? The government will point to wider benefits such as the removal of PRP, options for more flexi working and a promised earlier timeline for the process, but will that be enough?

And fourth and finally, on that contentious VAT scheme for private school fees, the Treasury had further details in the form of a technical paper this week.

Fees will become applicable from this week to avoid pre-payments while the difficult issue of what to do about those in the private sector with Education, Health, and Care Plans is likely to involve a reclaim system.

The scheme remains controversial with for example the Independent Schools Council complaining that “the draft legislation was published before consultation with independent schools.”

The government suggests that “the number of pupils who may switch schools as a result of these changes represents a very small proportion of overall pupil numbers in the state sector.” And “after recovery of VAT on their costs, on average, the government expects schools to be liable for VAT amounting to around 15% of their fee income. It will be a commercial decision for individual schools how they fund this additional cost,” it added.

On to the rest of the education news this week.

In schools, with the DfE reportedly raising the risk level on SEND provision, a further report this week added its voice to claims of “a broken system.” The report from Child of the North and the Centre for Young Lives said families were ‘at their wits’ ends’ and that ‘tackling the delays, the poor early identification, and the postcode lottery’ should be a priority for the new government.

In other news, leading bodies have been blitzing us with their annual reports and accounts this week.

They’ve included both Ofqual and the Standards and Testing Agency. Both pointed to a busy year of getting things back to normal after the pandemic. As Ofqual’s Chair put it, “the return to normal for examinations and assessments in 2023 was an important achievement in the recovery from COVID-19 for both the education sector and the nation as a whole.”

There’s plenty of data and summaries in the reports but as they cover 2023/24, they are very much of their time with the new government now firmly in place.

In FE, the UCU picked up the baton for FE which missed out on the Chancellor’s pay award this week.  “We therefore urge the Chancellor to rectify this deeply damaging neglect of further education in her first full Budget by properly investing.”

According to the AoC “The next meeting between FE employers and unions is in September and that looks likely to be the start of a set of difficult negotiations “

WorldSkills UK tied the knot with UVAC, the uniformed services again did well in the latest listing of top apprenticeship employers, and ESFA added its annual report and accounts for 2023/24 to the growing pile this week. The CE pointed to high levels of performance following a year of transition.

“We achieved a success rate of 99.9% on the accuracy and timeliness of the 571,977 individual payments we made to more than 25,000 providers.” As he said, ‘a terrific achievement.’

In HE, King’s College Policy Institute reported on its latest big survey of attitudes among graduates, parents and the public towards university.

Most, especially graduates, continue to value the experience – “eight in 10 say their degree was worth it for the overall experience and benefits” - but there’s a notable swing towards more skills-based courses and concerns among parents and the public about costs and value for money. Interestingly public responses favoured different feel levels for different courses.

The OfS was another to publish its latest annual report and accounts for 2023/24 pointing to another year “of significant activity and change” ahead of the recent changes from the new government that will bring yet another year of activity and change.

The Office’s likely shift in focus towards ensuring the financial sustainability of the sector will be one of the things to watch in the coming months. Particularly with the Times Higher reporting this week on ‘a difficult recruitment round’ for some universities.

Elsewhere, the OfS set out a new condition of registration to help tackle harassment and sexual misconduct affecting students.

The new condition comes in next August and includes the scrapping of non-disclosure agreements. Something that’s greatly pleased the NUS given its been campaigning against their use for seven years.

“An incredible win,” it exclaimed before adding, “together we made sexual harassment and violence a priority across higher education and the government has heard us loud and clear”.  

A week that will be hard to forget for many reasons.

Links to most of these stories below starting with the week’s headlines.

The top headlines of the week:

• ‘School strikes ‘now unlikely’ after 5.5% pay offer’ (Monday).
• ‘SEND pressures become ‘top tier’ DfE risk’ (Tuesday).
• ‘Universities in England face fines if they fail to protect students from harassment’ (Wednesday).
• ‘Government urged to protect teachers as misconduct claims rise’ (Thursday).
• ‘Government shelves £1.3bn UK tech and AI plans’ (Friday).

More specifically ...

Schools:

• Teachers’ pay. The government confirmed that it would meet this year’s pay award for teachers in full as well as accept other recommendations to improve conditions for teachers including removing the PRP requirement.
• Pay Body report. The School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) published its full report outlining many of the issues around teacher recruitment and retention, working conditions and comparative earnings potential, concluding by recommending among other things an across the board 5.5% pay increase, the creation of a long-term workforce plan and the opportunity for more flexible working patterns.
• VAT consultation. The government published draft legislation and a Technical Consultation on the application of 20% VAT on boarding and private school fees which are intended to become applicable on fees paid from 29 July 2024 and which the government is urging such schools not to pass on in full.
• ABS. The Chancellor confirmed that as part of the efficiencies listed in her Statement to MPs on public spending that the government would drop former government plans to introduce an Advanced British Standard (ABS) qualification.
• Academy trust handbook. The ESFA published the latest version of the Academy trust handbook incorporating “a small number of changes” including on finance leasing, internal audit on revenue income over £50m pa, and estates management.
• Missing mothers. The New Britian Project think tank highlighted the growing number of young mothers leaving teaching because of the exhausting hours and lack of flexi working, calling for better support, childcare places and flexible working arrangements generally.
• Tackling SEND. The Centre for Young Lives and Child of the North published a new report further highlighting inadequacies in the current SEND system which often leave families in despair, pointing to examples of where good practice is operating and calling among other things for better training, partnership work and early identification tools as ways forward.
• Annual report. Ofqual published its annual report and accounts for 2023/24 which saw a change of leadership, an office move, a big focus on the return to pre-pandemic grading for exams and assessments, the development of new qualifications such as GCSE British Sign Language, and a range of other research and developmental activity.
• Annual report. The Standards and Testing Agency published its annual report and accounts for 2023/24 pointing to a ‘smoothed out’ delivery of KS tests for summer 2023 despite some initial unease over the KS2 reading test, continuing work on developing digital assessments, and expenditure ‘in line with forecast costs.’

FE/Skills:

• Top apprenticeship employers. The government published the latest annual listing of top apprenticeship employers with Army once again heading the list, followed by BT, the Royal Navy and Royal Airforce.
• Annual report. The ESFA published its annual report and accounts for 2023/24 which, following a year of transition, saw it refocused around delivering funding certainty, quality support, and assurance with a claimed high success rate in each.
• Skills matters. Personnel Today reflected on some of the many skills priorities facing the new skills body, Skills England, highlighting both immediate needs around local skills and skills gaps as well as future skills planning, non-levy training and partnership working.
• Skills partnership. WorldSkills UK announced that it had formally tied the knot with the University Vocational Awards Council (UVAC.)
• Manufacturing. The manufacturing body, Make UK, published its latest annual facts and figures picture on the sector showing that it the N.W. remains the leading manufacturing area, the US is the top export destination when it comes to manufacturing, and overall, manufacturing contributed £217bn in output to the economy last year.

Not-to-be-missed numbers of the week:

• £22bn. The size of the ‘black hole’ in the public finances, as identified by the Chancellor.
• £8.1bn. The ‘efficiencies’ the government is looking to make next year as part of its drive to stabilise finances, according to the Chancellor.
• 2%. The reduction in admin budgets for public spending depts, called for by the Chancellor.
• 4. The number of new quangos announced by the government over the last week, according to one commentator on Quango Watch.
• 80%. The overall participation rate of employees in Great Britain in a workplace pension, similar to last year before according to latest government figures.
• 87%. The number of graduates who reckon they’d choose to go to university again if given the choice, according to a survey from King’s College.
• 2.6M. The number of jobs provided by UK manufacturing, according to the manufacturer’s body Make UK.
• £49,000+. The median salary for teachers following this year’s pay award, according to government figures.
• 20%. The number of people surveyed who said they intended to spend more this Christmas than last, according to PwC’s consumer sentiment survey (with apologies for the Christmas mention already).

Everything else you need to know ...

What to look out for next week

• MPs’ summer break (Tuesday 30 July – Monday 2 September).