A row between a local MSP and West Lothian Council over teacher numbers and education funding moved into its second week ahead of the crucial council budget vote on February 21.
Senior council officials backed up the head of the education executive in asserting that West Lothian had used all the funds allocated to hire staff, and had spent its own cash to increase teacher numbers by 149 since 2019.
The response came as the Scottish Government attempted to shore up its late intervention on plans by many Scottish councils to either cut the school day or reduce teacher numbers in the face of harsh budget demands.
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Data – published by the Scottish Government - highlights that there were 2,058 teachers employed by West Lothian Council in December 2022 compared to 1,909 in December 2019.
West Lothian renewed its position that it had spent all of the extra £5.6million it had been allocated by Holyrood to provide an additional 83.41 full time equivalent (FTE) teachers and 19.81 FTE pupil support workers in 2022 to 2023.
A council spokesperson added: “Over the last three years, West Lothian Council has invested additional funding from its own resources to increase the number of teachers further. West Lothian Council's additional funding has meant that there are now 149 additional teachers working in West Lothian's classrooms compared to December 2019."
And Councillor Andrew McGuire, chair of the education executive told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “The Scottish Government’s own data is clear and highlights the council has significantly increased teacher numbers as part of our commitment to improving the standard of education within West Lothian.
“Some of the recent media coverage on this issue has been clouded, inaccurate and confusing for many people.
“What parents want to know is that teacher numbers have increased and that attainment in West Lothian has risen year on year. We have had a decade of continued achievement for West Lothian schools in terms of exam results and investment in school buildings.”
West Lothian Council's depute chief executive responsible for education Dr Elaine Cook added: “Teacher numbers have been a complex issue as much of the funding provided to us by the Scottish Government in 2021 was a temporary one-off funding package to support schools during the pandemic and subsequent recovery period.
“By its very definition one-off funding can only be spent once and does not allow us to maintain the same level of spending in subsequent years. However, in Autumn 2021, the Scottish Government confirmed that some of the temporary funding was being made permanent, all of which has been used to employ staff in permanent contracts.
“I can assure parents and teachers that we have many more teachers working in West Lothian schools than we did three years ago and that all funding provided to us to increase teacher numbers has been spent - in full - on providing additional school staff. All funding has been utilised in accordance with guidelines provided by the Scottish Government. "
The council statement came as Fiona Hyslop MSP for the Linlithgow constituency welcomed new measures to ensure that teacher and pupil support staff numbers, as well as school hours are protected as announced in Holyrood yesterday by the Education Secretary, Shirley-Anne Somerville.
The statement followed an unofficial announcement by the Education Secretary two weeks ago following weeks of stories about local authorities considering cutting teacher numbers to meet budget cut demands.
Mrs Hyslop doubled down on her comments last week that West Lothian had not fully used the additional money provided to recruit teachers.
Mrs Hyslop said: “My constituency in West Lothian is the largest in Scotland by population and is growing rapidly. I am pleased that the Scottish Government has reiterated its commitment to increase teacher numbers by 3,500 during this Parliament (2023/24) and that it will withhold or recoup funding allocated to local authorities who do not use Government funding to achieve this aim.
“This education statement confirms that I was right to raise concerns about the failure to recruit additional teachers with Government money and West Lothian Council’s decision to use this year’s funding to simply backfill existing teaching staff on fixed term contracts by moving them on to permanent contracts instead of recruiting the new additional 100 teachers this funding provided for.
“While ensuring permanent contracts for existing teachers is welcome, the Council agreed to use their £5.256m funding to recruit new additional teachers. I hope that with the measures expressed in today’s statement, that they will comply with the new requirements the Government is setting for this money to be used to at least maintain teacher numbers in the year ahead (2023/24) and ensure minimum school hours are met.
“While it is clear that there are budgetary pressures on both the Scottish Government and Local Authorities, school pupils across Scotland cannot suffer as a result.”
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