Plan for education cuts draws furious response

The Government looks set to unveil further public spending cuts this week despite facing angry criticism over possible £2 billion cost-cutting programme in schools.

The Children's Secretary Ed Balls proposed axing up to 3,000 deputy heads and other senior posts as part of a bid to find the cash to fund frontline services, prompting warnings that teaching standards would be hit as a result.

Setting out the first concrete evidence of the cuts Gordon Brown publicly conceded were needed last week, he also warned teachers to expect to feel the pinch in pay packets.

The changes, which involve merging some schools' administrations, were vital to protect the jobs of ordinary teachers, he claimed, and could mainly be achieved through "natural wastage".

But he was warned by furious unions and a senior Labour MP that the "disastrous" plan to merge schools' administrations would impact on the classroom.

As the argument over where the post-recession axe will fall intensified, Labour launched a furious backlash against Tory claims they planned a secret income tax rise.

Shadow chancellor George Osborne said leaked Treasury figures showed a £14.8 billion rise in expected revenues in 2011/12 - the equivalent of a 3p rise in the income tax rate - which could not be explained by a predicted economic recovery.

But ministers said the figures were published at the time of the Budget in April, denied any hidden tax-raising plan and accused the Tories of "the politics of the big lie".

Chief Secretary to the Treasury Liam Byrne was among a succession of cabinet ministers who accused Mr Osborne of misleading voters and engaging in "schoolboy" politics.

"He either does not understand economics or he is deliberately distorting the truth. I'm afraid neither is a qualification to be chancellor," he told Sky News.

Mr Osborne stuck to his claims, questioning why receipts from National Insurance and other taxes did not appear to be predicted to rise in line with such a recovery.

"What we've done is tell you the truth, shown you figures the Treasury didn't want to show you ... on these tax increases that are there, pencilled into the Red Book," he said.

Officials insisted the rise in income tax was in line with those seen in the aftermath of previous recessions and that it would be illegal to publish projections based on unannounced policies.

Mr Balls said he would not force any schools to work together - but warned that unless savings were found then teachers' jobs and other crucial services would be at risk.

"We are talking to teachers' leaders ... to see what we can do to find the savings which we will need to make sure, in the next spending review, we can keep the 40,000 extra teachers, 110,000 more teaching assistants, after-school clubs, the school building programme," he told the BBC.

John Dunford, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, was among teaching union leaders who hit out at the proposals.

"The claim by the secretary of state that the number of heads and senior school staff can be reduced without damaging teaching quality is manifestly false," he said.

"It is school leaders who have borne the brunt of implementing the huge number of changes introduced by the Government and it would be the ultimate irony if it is they who are sacrificed to get the country out of its economic predicament."

The proposals were welcomed by one teaching union, with NASUWT head Chris Keates backing the targeting of a "proliferation" of heads and deputies who worked as administrators not teachers.

Mr Balls, who has been at the forefront of Labour warnings to voters that they must choose between Labour investment and Tory cuts, denied making a U-turn with his cuts plans.

"I said a few months ago that I wanted to see us carrying on with real-terms rises in our key public services but that we would have to be smarter and defter and find efficiency savings to make that really work," he said.

"There is a big difference between that, which is the right, honest thing to do and saying, 'we won't raise the taxes', which is the Conservatives position, and because 'we want an inheritance tax cut' which costs £1.7 billion we now find out, they would have a £10 billion hole in their public finances which would mean much bigger cuts "

Mr Brown told trade unionists last week that Labour would "cut costs, cut inefficiencies, cut unnecessary programmes and cut lower priority budgets" but protect frontline services.

It was the first time he had used the word "cuts" but came as the Tories produced other leaked Treasury papers which showed the Government had been planning cuts of more than 9% for months.