§ Lord Roganasked Her Majesty's Government:
What progress has been made in reducing disparity of funding between primary schools and post-primary schools in Northern Ireland; and whether they have any plans to provide equality of funding for the primary school children of Northern Ireland. [HL296]
§ Lord Williams of MostynThe Government are committed to narrowing the funding differential between primary and post-primary schools and have introduced a number of measures to provide additional resources for the primary sector; for example, the "Making a Good Start" initiative, (P1 and P2 classes), assistance to schools to limit class sizes at Key Stage 1 and the budget addition for schools.
Legislation is being prepared which will provide for the introduction of a single common LMS formula. This will allow progress to be made in narrowing the gap through formula allocations and though this must be gradual because of the need to keep the process manageable.
The nature of post-primary curriculum, its mode of delivery and the extent of support arrangements (staffing, equipment and resource materials) are quite different from that of the primary sector and generally more expensive. Thus while the Government are satisfied that primary schools should receive a greater share of available resources, they do not feel that equal funding would be appropriate. Post-primary pupils will therefore continue to require additional funding and as such a differential will remain.