§ Mr. Deakinsasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what evidence he has linking resources available to schools with quality of work by staff and pupils; and if there is a statistical correlation between the two factors.
§ Mr. DunnThe latest report by Her Majesty's inspectors on the effects of LEA expenditure policies on education, published in May 1985, showed that there was a statistically significant association between work judged satisfactory or better and satisfactory levels of appropriate resources. However, there was no direct causal link established.
Some evidence linking resources in schools to examination results is available from statistical analyses carried out by the Department and published in Statistical Bulletin 13/84. The analysis demonstrated a strong statistical association between examination results achieved by pupils at schools in each local authority and social background data for each authority. When these factors are taken into account, the analysis showed a slight positive but statistically significant correlation between some of the measures of examination results and expenditure on teaching.