ASCL's ten asks for education 

The Chancellor announced in the Autumn Budget that from April 2026 the government will remove the two-child limit on Universal Credit. It is estimated that there will be 450,000 fewer children in relative low income by 2030 as a result of this policy change. The government has also announced that, from September 2026, the eligibility criteria for free school meals in England will be expanded to all children in families receiving Universal Credit (rather than only those with annual household income of less than £7,400). It has also published its child poverty strategy which includes other measures. We welcome the action taken by the government. However, it remains the case there are currently around 4.5 million children in the UK living in poverty and that more will need to be done.

 

The government is due to publish a Schools White Paper in early February which will include reform of the SEND system. Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has said this will be underpinned by five principles: 

1. Early. Children should receive the support they need as soon as possible. 
2. Local. Children and young people with SEND should be able to learn at a school close to their home. 
3. Fair. Every school should be resourced and able to meet common and predictable needs.
4. Effective. Reforms should be grounded in evidence, ensuring all education settings know where to go to find effective practice.
5. Shared. Education, health and care services should work in partnership with one another, local government, families, teachers, experts and representative bodies.

The financial situation for schools and colleges remains extremely challenging. In summer 2025, the government published its spending review which set departmental budgets for day-to-day spending until 2028-29. Analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) concluded that when forecasted spending on SEND provision was taken into account “the best schools could hope for is a real-terms freeze in mainstream school funding per pupil between 2025 and 2028.” 

IFS analysis of plans set out in the Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper in November found that funding for 16-19 education is set to increase by 3% in real-terms per student between 2025-26 and 2026-27. However, this still leaves funding levels below those of the early 2010s.

ASCL’s view is that education funding continues to be wholly insufficient for the provision needed by children and young people and the many expectations made of schools and colleges.
 

The government is expanding community-based support by funding up to 1,000 ‘Best Start Family Hubs’ by the end of 2028. These are similar in conception to the Sure Start centres which were largely dismantled as a result of cuts in the early 2010s under the government of the time. They will provide families with services such as early language support, debt and welfare advice, domestic abuse support, housing support, parenting support and mental health services. ASCL welcomes this initiative but it remains to be seen whether this network will have the coverage and level of investment that is required by communities.

Recruitment to postgraduate initial teacher training has improved in 2025-26 with targets for primary education exceeded, and 88% of the secondary education target achieved. While this is a significant improvement on recent years, it remains the case that the secondary target has still not been met since 2012/13 (except during the pandemic in 2020/21). 

ASCL is concerned that the government’s proposed pay award of 6.5% over the next three years is insufficient to support recruitment and retention, and by the government’s indication that it will only be partially funded, with schools expected to make further savings to cover the gap. We are also concerned that the government has still not published its strategy for recruiting an additional 6,500 teachers.
 

In early 2025, a report by the National Audit Office showed a £13.8 billion backlog in school maintenance. The government spending review in June 2025 included a commitment to increase annual maintenance investment per year in line with inflation, and around £2.4 billion per year for the school rebuilding programme over the next four years. The rebuilding programme will be expanded to include a further 250 schools in addition to the 518 already selected for rebuilding.

While this investment is welcome, ASCL doubts that it will be sufficient to address the substantial historic backlog of repairs and maintenance across the school estate. We remain concerned that many schools and colleges are reliant on the annual bidding process through the Condition Improvement Fund for the costs of vital works.
 

Every year about a third of children do not achieve at least a Grade 4 in GCSE English and maths, impacting on their life chances and condemning them to a grinding cycle of mandatory resits in post-16 education. The Curriculum and Assessment Review was published in November 2025 and contained a number of welcome recommendations. However, ASCL remains concerned that it did not go far enough in finding solutions which improve the fortunes of the forgotten third. A new ‘stepping stone’ qualification is planned for some 16-19 learners but this seems unlikely to be sufficient to significantly improve resit outcomes.
 

The government has accepted a central argument of the Protect Student Choice campaign that there should be a vocational qualification pathway for 16-19 learners alongside A levels and T levels, and is planning to introduce V levels. These will replace existing applied general qualifications. ASCL remains concerned about the immediate gap created by the removal of larger applied general qualifications – two and three A level equivalent – and believes this size of qualification should also have a place in the new V level landscape.
 

ASCL continues to have grave misgivings about the new inspection system introduced by Ofsted which applies a five-point grading scale to schools across multiple evaluation areas. We are concerned about the reliability and consistency of a system which seeks to make so many judgements in the space of a single inspection, and the potential toll on the mental health and wellbeing of school and college leaders. We are monitoring the impact of this new system very closely.

We have welcomed the efforts of the government to strike a positive note and work in partnership with the profession. We believe that more work is needed on building a new ‘social contract’ between parents and schools to facilitate a supportive relationship and together address issues over behaviour, attendance and complaints.