A clampdown on student behaviour, a series of new free schools and billions of pounds in new funding will be announced by the government within days, according to a leaked document.
The Guardian says the briefing document lists policy proposals for schools in England designed to be announced over the coming weeks. It is dated 22 August and marked “Official-Sensitive”.
The disciplinary measures include an increased focus on exclusions, allowing teachers to use “reasonable force” to improve behaviour and encouraging schools to confiscate or ban mobile phones.
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The document states: “We will back heads to use powers to promote good behaviour including sanctions and rewards; using reasonable force; to search and confiscate items from pupils (including mobile phones); impose same-day detentions; suspend and expel pupils; ban mobile phones.”
The £3.5bn funding announcement is expected to be less controversial, although The Guardian cautions that many teachers “will want to wait until they see how much of the headline figure has been ‘reprioritised’ from the DfE’s previous spending commitments”.
The sum includes £2.8bn for primary and secondary schools up to the age of 16, including £800m for children with special educational needs and disabilities. Pay for teachers will be increased, with starting salaries rising to £30,000 by 2022.
An extra £800m for sixth form and further education colleges is mentioned but the details of how that funding will be allocated are still under discussion with the Treasury.
The third main plank of the document involves a commitment to open a fresh wave of free schools, including alternative provision schools for excluded children. The document says it hopes to build on what it describes as “the existing success and momentum of the free school programme”.
The increase in funding can be viewed in the context of recent cuts. Last year, the Institute for Fiscal Studies calculated that per pupil funding had been cut by 4% in real terms since 2015, after a freeze was imposed by the Tory government.
Guardian columnist Aditya Chakrabortty says the new policy document “isn’t defined by care for the children who represent the future of this country but a cold, hard cynicism about what gets headlines, what tickles swing voters and what might win an election”.
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