HEADTEACHERS around Swindon have claimed that their school's "tight" budgets are at breaking point and voiced concerns about "unsustainable" low funding.

Banners have been put up at several schools and information has been sent to pupils' parents in an effort to highlight funding woes which headteachers say are the worst they've ever experienced..

Sherryl Bareham, headteacher at Dorcan Academy, said: "It is becoming increasingly difficult to set a balanced budget - in 30 years of being in the profession I have never known budgets so tight.

"We have found it necessary to cut services which we deem essential to the wellbeing of students in order to fulfil an even more important essential of having teachers in front of classes and keeping class sizes reasonable.

"Finances are so tight now that there is no room for manoeuvre or contingency for unforeseen eventualities and there is no glimmer of hope of any improvement - in fact, we anticipate the situation getting worse.

"As a headteacher, it is the thing that keeps me awake at night and I know that other headteachers are hugely concerned."

Sally Clarke, headteacher at Nythe Primary School, said: "It's crucial that the public are made aware of the financial pressure being placed upon schools, particularly at a time when the level of accountability and public interest in the progress and attainment made by pupils is the highest I have known in my 25 years in teaching."

According to the National Education Union, the education budget in England has seen a real-terms decrease of £2.8 billion between 2015 to 2020 - a £3.1 million decrease in Swindon alone.

The union have been trying to make the public more aware of this statistic with a rally in the town centre, an 'Education Question Time' event, and this banner campaign.

In response, Swindon MPs have noted that the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies found that the government has protected the core schools budget in real terms, and funding for England schools is at a record high of almost £43 billion

Eirian Painter, headteacher of Lainesmead Primary school said: "We run as efficiently as we possibly can and, despite the government asking us to make efficiencies, we cannot, in all honesty, make any more.

"When faced with an £80,000 cut in a budget in one academic year, efficiencies are not enough.

"Last year we had to halve the number of teaching assistants in the school which has a direct impact on the number of interventions we are able to run to support the children’s learning as well as the support they receive in class.

"A further area cut is the number of sessions we're able to buy for children who need emotional support in order to access learning.

"This is completely unsustainable, this needs to be stopped.

"Lainesmead are projected to have lost £328 per pupil between 2015 and 2020, and the impact is ultimately on the children who cannot receive the rounded education they so rightly deserve."