A DEMAND that a plan to reduce school deficits approaching £9 million doesn’t impact staffing levels has led to a row among councillors.

Conservative councillors called for the report as the figure, which is the combined amount built up by schools that have spent more than they have been funded for, hit £6.9m in June.

The council’s Labour and Green Party run cabinet opposed the motion as individual schools, rather than the local authority, are responsible for staffing decisions but was defeated in a vote of the full council.

The council’s latest financial report predicts 18 of the council’s 34 schools, and its pupil referral unit, will be in deficit at the end of the financial year with the combined figure expected to reach £9.3m.

Conservative councillor Alistair Neill said councillors needed to understand how those deficits would be reduced “without cutting teaching and support staff who are so essential to our schools.”

But Labour’s cabinet member Ben Callard, who is responsible for finance, said the Conservative is aware he and education and finance officers, as well as the cabinet member for schools, regularly meet with the leadership of the schools in deficit.

As schools are responsible for managing their own budgets they also make their own decisions on staffing, said Cllr Callard: “The council is not responsible for staffing that is the job of school leadership and governing bodies”.

He said the council has agreed deficits can be reduced over “an extended period of time” and added: “Staff account for about 85 per cent of school revenue costs and which is why we’ve given them an extended period.”

The council had also provided schools with an additional £1m, above pay and pension commitments, for the past two years said Cllr Callard who claimed funding only increased by eight per cent during the previous Conservative administration.

He said an updated financial report is already due to go before a scrutiny committee, chaired by Cllr Neill, next week and a further report would take up the time of council officers.

Deputy leader Paul Griffiths said it was “misleading” to suggest the council was responsible for school staffing and councillors “should be honest” that pupil numbers and funding are “tied”.

Labour’s Armand Watts said it was “in the Labour Party’s DNA” to support schools.

Cllr Neill claimed the responses were a “demonstration of how to avoid handling a hot potato” and he said the council is responsible for the funding provided to schools.

The motion was supported by 21 councillors, including four independent councillors, with only 19 votes against. Technical issues meant the roll call vote was repeatedly interrupted and the chairman agreed to accept votes from two Labour councillors, submitted via the messaging service to the monitoring officer as they couldn’t appear on screen to state their votes.

The motion calls for the cabinet member to bring a report, in advance of next year’s budget, on reducing the deficits which “explains how this overspend will be managed downwards without impacting school staffing levels which are critical for our schools.”