HEADTEACHERS aren’t given to hyperbole. It’s rare to find one who is prepared to go on the record about school finance – let alone dozens of them in the same town.

The Government says school funding has been protected from the worst ravages of austerity, but headteachers aren’t immune from rising costs – everything from higher prices on essential equipment, to pensions and energy.

Politicians have made things worse with their constant tinkering to the national curriculum – changes which require more money for staff training.

Funding per pupil has not in proportion to inflation and there is no spare cash to deal with soaring costs. The cupboard is bare.

Under the Department for Education’s latest funding formula for education, small rural schools – many in the North-East and North Yorkshire – will be the biggest losers.

And their problems will have the greatest impact on socially and physically disadvantaged children.

Special needs co-ordinators may become a luxury some schools cannot afford. Replacing clapped out computers will be a thing of the past.

The gap between these children and schools in more affluent areas, where well-off parents can afford to subsidise their children’s extra curricular activities, is already widening at a frightening rate. Are we going to condemn disadvantaged kids to a cut-price education as well?

Our teachers are doing a fantastic job, but their workloads are unsustainable. Under-valued and over-worked, thousands of good teachers are leaving the profession. They are burnt out.

Theresa May’s inexplicable obsession with grammar schools has blinded her to the wider truth: England’s schools are on the brink of financial disaster.