General Election 2010: Labour press conference on public services

General Election 2010: Labour press conference on public services; Ed Balls press conference continues SOT - As the letter in the Guardian today makes clear from 51 headteachers, they say rather than steady investment in the whole system, there would be across the board cuts, boutique experiments borrowed as a result of naive educational tourism - that is the headteachers verdict on Conservative free market schools policy / we'll empower parents, back school leaders, Tories will abandon parents / we will give school leaders the resources they need / funding per pupil will rise this year, next year and year after by over 2 percent / in contrast, the Tories refuse to match our pledge of rising funding for schools / schools are the biggest unprotected budget in the Conservative plans this year / George Osborne has promised six billion cuts this year, that would mean for schools a 1.7 billion pound cut starting in a few weeks time / this would mean a reduction of 14,000 teachers, a total of 20,000 teachers and classroom support staff / that would mean over 38,000 people losing their jobs or not being hired in the current year / before the Tories say they can find 1.7 billion pounds in the schools budget by efficiencies, let them explain how they can do this / let them also explain also how they would pay for their free market schools policy / under the Tories, no guarantees for pupils, parents abandoned, funding cut from every existing school with layoffs this year, with Labour clear guarantees so every child suceeds, more say for parents and a bigger role for the best school leaders, all backed by rising funding year on year / empowerment versus abandonment / excellence for all under Labour, excellent for the few under the Conservatives