Achi news desk-
Opposition education secretary Liam Kerr said successive SNP education secretaries – including their new leader John Swinney – had passed “brutal and sustained” cuts to the sector, rather than fully funding them.
Audit Scotland warned last year that “risks to the financial sustainability of the college sector” had increased, while reports said the Scottish Funding Council had identified three colleges with “significant cash flow issues”.
Higher and Further Education Minister Graeme Dey was hit on the staggering financial difficulties facing the sector after the Herald revealed the nearly half a billion pound shortfall on Monday as part of our series State of Scotland’s Colleges.
For the year 2024-25, colleges are due to receive a total of £643,040,000 from the Scottish government; however, inflation from 2021 means that the sector would actually have needed more than £834m of funding this year to avoid a cut in real terms to their budgets.
Over the three-year period from 2021-22, the total gap in the combined budget is more than £464m.
The minister said he doubts the Herald’s figure although he accepts there is a “gap”.
He said the Scottish Government was facing “extraordinary financial challenges” after “years of austerity.”
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Mr Kerr said “fantastic staff and talented students” were being let down by the SNP Government’s lack of action.
He said: “Successive SNP education secretaries – including John Swinney – have repeatedly changed Scotland’s vital colleges sector.
“The leader-in-waiting of the SNP along with others responsible for our colleges have handed them brutal and ongoing cuts year after year.
“When I challenged the SNP minister on the staggering funding gap facing colleges, he typically deflected the blame elsewhere and had no plan to fix this crisis which is why we are using our time at Holyrood to be challenged again.
“The financial strain on colleges is bad enough, but the SNP Government is failing them in many other areas.
“It ignores much-needed reforms, and has not created an environment where colleges can be flexible or show more innovation.
“The potential and indeed the current outputs of Scotland’s colleges are incredible, led by fantastic staff and talented and committed students – but they are being let down by the SNP government.”
“The SNP minister must listen to these calls from the Scottish Conservatives and the sector, otherwise colleges will only be at greater risk.”
A Scottish Government spokesman said: “Although the 2024-25 Budget is the most challenging to deliver under devolution, we have safeguarded as much investment as possible in the college sector, with more than £750 million to support’ the work of providing high quality services. Education and training.
“This support will continue to ensure that colleges continue to play a vital role in future economic growth, opening up vocational and academic pathways for young people, enabling them to fulfill their potential.”
