The SNP policy to reduce teacher class contact time to allow teachers more time to prepare joins an ever growing list of policies unfunded by the Scottish Government and leaving councils facing a financial oblivion.
Commenting following a meeting of the children’s and young peoples services committee today Cllr Tim Eagle (Buckie Ward) said;
“Giving teachers more time to prepare is vital to ensure high quality teaching and progress our desires to see improvements in attainment across our schools. However during the meeting today Councillors were told by officers that we cannot fund more resources to support attainment in our schools for more than 1 year as we need that money to pay for this policy.
The Moray Conservatives have for 5 years had a sustained commitment to improving education in Moray by supporting our teachers and fighting to provide a wider curriculum offer, sadly COVID-19 has impacted on that item but today we fought to ensure that additional monies allocated to schools would be useful in the long term.
The SNP however were keen to ensure this was only a temporary commitment as their own leaders in Edinburgh refuse to pay for key commitments.
This is yet another SNP policy that is forced on councils to deliver but comes with no idea of the funding attached.
I urge people in Moray to be reminded of that when they cast their votes this year, the SNP are giving with one hand and taking away with the other.
Further commenting is Cllr Frank Brown (Elgin North)
“Today I set out why it is important we continue to support our young people after a gruelling 2 years, we want attainment to be a key priority yet Nicola Sturgeon is refusing to pay for key party commitments and local SNP Leader Cllr Graham Leadbitter seems to be doing little to fight for Moray.
The SNP Councillors seem to be suggesting that funding for less than a year will make a difference when in fact it causes a huge amount of work to senior staff with no long term commitment. That is a disgraceful approach.
What Cllr Leadbitter should be doing is putting every effort into challenging his leaders to ensure party commitments are fully paid for.”
