§ 24. Mr. Terry Lewisasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science, in view of his speech to the north of England education conference on standards in education, if he will seek information from local education authorities about their projected expenditure on school books in each of the next five years.
§ Mr. DunnNo. Local education authorities set their budgets one year at a time in the light of their own needs and priorities and Government policies. Provisional information on expenditure shows that between 1981–82 and 1982–83 the provision for new books per pupil by LEAs rose by over 7 per cent. in secondary schools and by over 11 per cent. in primary schools. If costs can be contained, the plans for local authority recurrent expenditure on education in 1984–85 should allow for some further improvement in the majority of authorities in aggregate.