Another promise made, another promise broken. This week it’s the turn of Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson to abandon one of Labour’s biggest pledges. Labour said they would employ 6,500 more teachers. It was one of the main promises in their election manifesto, less than a year ago.
But in the statistics that came out yesterday teacher numbers were down, not up. There were 2,900 fewer teachers in primary schools. Labour’s response? To move the goalposts and say that primary schools now don’t count. That’s extremely insulting to those who teach in primary schools.
It’s also an insult to the intelligence of the rest of us – to try and fiddle the figures in such an obvious way. It’s not the only broken promise from Phillipson, who is getting a bad reputation for such sneaky moves.
In the last election Labour promised not to increase national insurance, but they famously broke that promise, and someone earning just £13,000 a year will be taking home £500 less as a result of the tax increase. They did at least say they would fully fund schools to offset the impact of this.
But then they broke that promise too. Some schools were short-changed by more than a third. Next they broke their promise to fully fund the pay award for teachers.
According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, this will leave a £400 million funding gap for schools next year. That gap is one reason many teachers are getting the sack right now, ahead of the start of the new school year in September.
As well as short-changing schools and presiding over falling teacher numbers, Phillipson has bowed to the trade unions and is undoing 30 years worth of cross party reforms with her disastrous Schools Bill.
Reforms over the last 30 years have raised standards and created more competition and choice for parents. England’s schools soared up the international league tables.
In contrast schools in Labour-run Wales remained run by the trade unions, and Welsh schools slumped down the same league tables as a result. And yet the reforms which worked in England are being undone, purely to suck up to the left and the trade unions.
Labour have broken their biggest promise in education, and they are trying to fiddle the figures to cover that up. It’s treating us like fools, and it’s letting our children down.
