Revealed: Board's plans to save money this year

A TASTE of just how savage funding cuts to the public services here will be has been revealed in a leaked document from the South Eastern Education and Library Board, which was passed anonymously to the Star this week.

The report, entitled 'Resource Allocation Plans 2010-11', reveals cuts proposed by the Board, including over 1 million in the budget for maintaining local schools and over 800,000 to the budget allocated for Special Schools.

The Board was quick to insist the plans had not been finalised and insisted it was a "working document". However, they confirmed the report has been submitted to the Department of Education for approval.

A spokesperson for the South Eastern Education and Library Board said: "This plan had been submitted to the Department of Education but has not yet been approved. There are ongoing discussions and revisions being made to this document. Therefore this should be regarded as a working document."

In the 'Resource Allocation Plan' the Board recommends cuts in a number of areas, most notably to the Special Needs budget, which they are looking to slash by 818,000 in the next year. They say this can be done by efficiency savings and charges to schools to be made 'without impacting on service delivery'.

The Board have also proposed cuts of 1.32 million to the maintenance budget, which, according to the report, has the "potential for increased risk in relation to Health and Safety provision."

Other savings include 245,000 by reducing the contingency fund and 190,000 in transport cuts. The total cuts recommended by the Board amounts to just over 4.2 million. The Education Minister must now consider the proposed cuts before they come into effect.

Lagan Valley MP Jeffrey Donaldson and MLA Paul Givan have set up an urgent meeting with SEELB Chief Executive Stanton Sloan to discuss the funding cuts.

"Before I and the other elected members were suspended from the Board for refusing to implement cuts in the special needs budget we were told that compared to other areas Lisburn and the South Eastern Area had gold-plated provision but to live within budget this had to be cut back to basic statutory requirements," said Mr Givan. "I recognise the financial difficulties facing the public sector but the last place cuts should be found is in special needs provision.

"I will be joining Mr Donaldson who has asked for a meeting with Stanton Sloan, the SEELB Chief Executive, to discuss funding for children with special needs and we will be making the point very clearly that there should be no cuts to frontline services for children that require extra support to give them the best opportunity in life," he concluded.