. —— geoff barton. it’s told me how school staff are coping. -- geoff itarton-_ -- geoff barton.ton. it's a pretty mixed picture but a pretty bad _ -- geoff barton. it's a pretty mixed picture but a pretty bad way - -- geoff barton. it's a pretty mixed picture but a pretty bad way to - picture but a pretty bad way to start a new school year, which should be about the optimism of young people starting school, a new class, new teachers, new uniforms. we have completely lost the sense of that in some schools, not all, because of the uncertainty, and uncertainty for parents over the weekend. they were told by the government they should hear from the school directly because at that point the government wasn't going to post the list. i think that added to the uncertainty. if i didn't hear from my child's school, i might think, did i miss the e—mail? we now have the list, as you say. it also means, ratherthan have the list, as you say. it also means, rather than welcoming young people back into school, teachers are spending time scrabbling around trying to identify certain types of conc

the general secretary of the ascl, geoff barton, is with us now. welcome, geoff.want to explain to viewers that it was because jonathan i want to explain to viewers that it was becausejonathan slater said that when rishi sunak was chancellor the treasury refused to put more money into repairing schools and actually cut funding that there is this political row, something the prime minister strongly denies. i think that is completely and utterly wrong. - actually one of the first things | i did as chancellor in my first| spending review in 2020 l was to announce a new ten year school rebuilding - programme for 500 schools. that equates to 50 schools a year| that will be refurbished or rebuilt. if you look at what we have been doing in the previous decade, i that is in line with what we have always done, about 50 schools. refurbished or rebuilt. that is what i announced as chancellor in my - first spending review. are you satisfied with that answer? i have to say, i'm not. it sounds pretty complacent. it sounds to me that the suggestion from the prime minister, chanc

we go live now to leicester to speak to geoff barton, general secretary at the association of schooling from school leaders, how is this affecting the start of the school term and pressure on teaching staff. it is a pretty mixed picture but it is a pretty bad way to start a new school year, a new school year should be about the optimism of young people, either starting school, having new classes, new teachers, new uniform. we have lost the sense of that in some schools because of the uncertainty. we have had the uncertainty for parents over the weekend, was their school going to be affected? they were told by the government they should hear from the government they should hear from the school directly because the government at that point wasn't going to post the list. i think that has added to the uncertainty because if i didn't hearfrom my child's school, i might be spending my time thinking did i miss the e—mail? we have now got the list. it also means that head teachers, rather than just welcoming young people back into school, time scrabbling around, trying to identify certain ty

is it the department of education may education itself that may have failed because we've got geoff bartonhat a lot schools, saying that a lot of schools, a lot of education authorities have actually sent the various questionnaires back to the department of education and yet are still getting requests. some have it three months ago to have sent it three months ago to i think the department for education is trying to wash its hands of all of this. >> and it's getting a bit too involved and blaming people. the department for education , department for education, including those civil including those senior civil servants , they need to be giving servants, they need to be giving advice to chancellors about where money is going and how where the money is going and how it's being spent. where the money is going and how it's being spent . we come back it's being spent. we come back to this point. there never to this point. there was never a shortage of money. i tell you what, if i was in the department for i'd quite for education, i'd be quite worried flaws worried today because the flaws in tha