Ahead of the 2024 spring budget, Paul Whiteman, general secretary of school leaders’ union NAHT, said:

“The budget is this government’s last chance before the election to invest in the nation’s children and reverse the crippling cuts schools have seen since 2010. The Prime Minister is running out of time to make good on the promise he made last year, that his “main funding priority at every spending review” would be education.

“The RAAC crisis shows that schools are struggling with outdated and inadequate facilities. It’s hard for teachers to get children to concentrate on their learning when they are distracted with leaky ceilings, crumbling, cold classrooms, and broken boilers.

“We are also calling on government to immediately commit sufficient funding for children and young people with special educational needs (SEND). The number of young people who require SEND support has spiralled at the same time as external support services have been cut. School finances are so pressed that they cannot cover the extra cost.

“The crisis in teacher recruitment and retention will snowball into a national emergency if the government does not restore teachers’ and leaders’ pay to 2010 levels. That starts with a double digit pay rise this year. Teaching is a fantastic career – but a decade of below inflation pay rises, and poor terms and conditions at a time when more employers are offering greater flexibility mean it is just not competitive in the graduate marketplace. This pay-rise must not come at the expense of the school budget, and we urge the Chancellor to protect any school funding on Wednesday.”