f40 group

response to funding consultation available (see below)

The f40 Group has finalised its submission to the consultation on schools, early years and 14-16 funding. You can read the full submission by clicking the link below and downloading the file.

I am supporting the f40 campaign because I recognise that inequalities still exist in the distribution of education funding and the gap between the higher and lower funded authorities is too wide.

Nevertheless, this Labour government has increased education funding massively over the past ten years and I welcome these changes. I am confident that only under a Labour government will we achieve the improvements that the f40 campaign group are looking for.

Reed In Meeting With F40 Campaign (20 March 2007)

Andy Reed MP today joined with the cross party group of F40 MPs in a meeting to thrash out a joint submission to government on school funding. The F40 group exists to lobby government on school funding for those at the lowest end of the spending table and Andy Reed has been a member of the group throughout his time as MP for Loughborough.

The F40 group are working together on a case for changing the government funding formula for schools. Andy Reed was the only representative of Leicestershire MPs to discuss the preferred option for the group in responding to the governments welcome consultation on future funding options.

"This is a highly complex area which affects every school in the country. Trying to get a funding formula that everybody thinks is fair is proving to be very difficult. Even amongst the group of F40 local authority areas and amongst MPs there are differing solutions. I offered my continuing support for F40 and offered some workable solutions rather than the political grandstanding we are increasingly seeing from Leicestershire County. If we are to make progress it needs detailed hard evidence based work. The consultation runs to 90 pages of technical data and we need to work hard at that level as well as the major points about fairness!”