§ Mrs. Gillian ShephardTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science how teacher salary costs are calculated in England for the local management formula for primary schools in the calculation of school budgets.
§ Mr. ButcherUnder local management of schools primary schools' budgets will be determined by a formula based largely on age-weighted pupil numbers. In deciding how heavily to weight each age of pupils, LEAs will need to make assumptions about average teaching costs for each age group. Circular 7/88 recognises that in the case of small schools there may be variations between the actual teaching costs and the LEA's average costs, due to teachers' position on the main scale and the incidence of salary safeguarding. LEAs may therefore adjust schools' budgets to reflect this factor.
In general, however, the degree of protection should be tapered according to the size of school, so that budget shares of schools with 10 or more teachers (excluding the head teacher and deputy head) are not adjusted to take this factor into account.