SCHOOLS in the region’s two biggest education authorities are to receive larger than expected increases in funding totalling £14.5m to correct years of “unfairness”.

Earlier this year the Government promised a £7.1m funding boost to North Yorkshire and a £4.3m increase for County Durham.

Both education authorities had been identified as among a group of 69 areas which have had historically low levels of funding compared with other areas.

Now Schools Minister David Laws has announced details of where the extra money is going.

North Yorkshire will receive a 3.1 per cent increase, amounting to a £9.9m top-up in 2015-16, or an extra £135 per pupil.

County Durham will now be allocated an additional 1.7 per cent, amounting to a £4.7m increase during the same period, or an extra £75 per pupil.

The only other North-Eastern area to benefit is Northumberland, which is to receive a 7.2 per cent increase, an extra £12m, which works out as £307 extra per pupil.

Nationally the biggest percentage rise - of 11 per cent or an additional £19.5m – is being allocated to the London borough of Bromley in Kent.

In March, the Government announced that it would take action to tackle what it described as “the unfair and complicated system of allocating local school funding”, and launched a consultation on how to deliver an additional £350m to schools in the most unfairly funded areas by setting minimum funding levels.

The Government has now published details of how the extra £390m will be allocated.

Officials at the Department of Education insist that other local councils' per pupil funding will not be reduced from its present level.

Mr Laws said: "This £390m increase - £40m more than was announced in March - is the biggest step toward fairer schools funding in a decade, and will go a long way to removing the historic unfairness of the funding system.

"Crucially, we have ensured no local authority will see a reduction in its budget, while 69 local authorities will get a cash boost.

"This increase in funding will make a real difference on the ground in the least fairly funded local areas, without creating instability, uncertainty or cuts in any areas.”