EDUCATION
Bricks without straw
RHODES BOYSON
For the last twenty years, local education authority spending on education has increased at an annual rate of 11 per cent in money terms or between 6 and 10 per cent in real terms. Between 1938/9 and 1967/8 the expenditure on education in this country in real terms increased by over 400 per cent and its share of the gross national product rose from 2 per cent to 53 per cent. The service became geared to regular expansion and when, in 1968, the Government decided to allow the rate support grant, which finan- ces more than half the educational expendi- ture of local authorities, to increase by only 3 per cent in real terms or 5-6 per cent in money terms, this was treated by all mem- bers of the educational service as a tempor- ary aberration, and the necessary money was saved by cuts in book and stationery allowances, furniture replacements and repair and maintenance. Teachers and local authorities alike expected to be able to re- deem these cuts by increased expenditure this year.
The recent White Paper on public expendi- ture 1968-9 to 1973-4, however, fixes an average increase in expenditure over the three years 1969-70 to 1971-2 of 3.8 per cent in real terms to be reduced further to 2 per cent for 1972-3 and 1973-4. On present assumptions this means an actual reduction in educational standards. An increased birth- rate and more pupils staying on beyond the school leaving age and in higher education require a minimum increase in the educa- tional budget of 6 per cent in real terms simply to maintain present standards. Be- tween 1968 and 1978 the Department of Education has estimated the increase in the school population to be of the order of 30 per cent, from 7.4 million to 9.5 million, and a high proportion of these increased num- bers will be in the expensive fifteen-and-over age groups. These extra fifth form numbers will then demand a great increase in pro- vision for further and higher education. To contain this increased provision within the White Paper figures is just impossible. Either the Government does not understand the figures or it is putting at risk the whole future of the educational service for the party political purpose of discrediting the overwhelmingly Tory-controlled local edu- cation authorities.
The actual future of educational expendi- ture is more uncertain now than at any period since the war. Over the last five years it has expanded largely at the expense of defence cuts, and the scope for further cuts without putting the country's security at grave risk just does not exist. If a Conserva- tive government is returned at the next elec- tion there is the promise of reduced taxa- tion. The Labour party is itself becoming aware of the clamour of the electorate for reduced taxes, and education will have to compete with housing for its share of public expenditure.
it is obvious that a firm decision is re- quired as to what proportion of the national income the country is prepared to spend on state education. This must be followed by a survey and a decision by the Government as to where this money can best be spent. The whole structure of education must be considered. For ten years we have had a series of commissions each looking at a seg- ment of education and each recommending particular expansions with little or no rele- vance to education as a whole. Crowther (1959) looked at the education of the fifteen- to-eighteen year olds, Newsom (1963) at secondary education for children of average or below-average ability. Robbins (1963) at full-time higher education, Plowden (1968) at primary education, and the Public Schools Commission (1968) looked into the integra- tion of public schools with the state system. Soon we shall have Donnison on direct grant schools and we are almost certain to have a commission appointed shortly on teacher training. Such reports have led to a switch of expenditure to below-average children, to educationally deprived areas and to the expansion of higher education. Pro- fessor G. N. Brown in a recent copy of Education refers to the result of these reports being `policy-making by lurches'.
'Since commitments now exceed resources a government survey or commission is re- quired to suggest a new order of priorities to enable the Government to decide where cuts must be made. The alternative is the main- tenance of present priorities, the end of all innovation and progress, and finally break- down and retreat when resources fail to meet needs. The report being considered by the Department of Education which sug- gests that the intake of women teachers should be cut by a third from 1975 by stipu- lating that all candidates for Colleges of Education must have GCE '0' levels in Eng- lish and mathematics led one to hope that sense was returning to the Department and that standards were to be raised. Unfortun- ately, however, the comment by Mr Short on BBC television earlier this month, that it was hoped that before 1980 nursery schools would be available to all from the age of two, made one realise that the present Government's incompetence or political manoeuvring on education was continuing.
There is much that a government survey could consider: loans for higher education, 'Shut the door—you're letting a draught in'
the end of subsidised school meals, fee-pay- ing nursery education, further rationalisation of sixth form provision, Industrial Training Boards taking more responsibility for adol- escent and university education, the use of ancillaries for teachers, the raising by parents of much school capital expenditure, and a school voucher system. Education officials, committee members and teachers must rise up and demand such a survey before they are blamed for educational breakdown. One cannot make bricks with- out straw and one cannot teach new methods without new books. A refusal to teach decimalisation and metrication without the necessary moneys would unite the country behind the schools more than teachers' strikes. Nor should a government be allowed to get away with promising all- round expansion while at the same time, by limiting finance, it prevents even the con- tinuance of present standards.
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