A PRIMARY school has announced proposals to make staff redundant as it battles with funding cuts which could reach £142,000.

Burnham Primary School, in Dunkirk Road, has revealed it is considering a “small number of redundancies”.

The school did not confirm or deny claims that those affected included learning support assistants and midday staff.

According to surveys conducted by the National Audit Office, the school could face up to £142,000 in funding cuts by 2019.

Kelly Stock, headteacher, said: “Due to impending government cuts, the school and its governing body are regrettably having to consider a small number of redundancies.

“The school is meeting with the local authority HR services and trade unions to discuss this possibility later in April but no final decisions have been made.

“We cannot yet comment on positions at risk yet as this has not been confirmed.”

Jerry Glazier, Secretary for the Mid Essex division of the National Union of Teachers, said redundancies were inevitable in the wake of the planned cuts.

He said: “We understand how thin resources are stretched in these current times, but by simply imposing reduced funding without offering support to schools to manage it, they will have to start making redundancies, because it’s the only thing they can do to balance the books.

“Reduced staff will mean the ones who remain take on bigger classes and increased workloads, and if not properly supported could have serious implications for parents and children and their standard of education.

“As a union, we will be campaigning for the government to recognise these issues to ensure all schools get the support they need to make it through this period, that they are treated fairly so the dip in educational quality doesn’t happen.”

A spokesman for the Department of Education said: “The government has protected the core schools budget in real terms since 2010, with school funding at its highest level on record at almost £41 billion in 2017-18 — and that is set to rise, as pupil numbers rise over the next two years, to £42 billion by 2019-20.

“We recognise that schools are facing cost pressures, which is why we will continue to provide support to help them use their funding in cost effective ways and make efficiencies.

“This includes improving the way they buy goods and services and our recently published School Buying Strategy is designed to help schools N save over £1bn a year by 2019-20.”