A CONTROVERSIAL shake-up of school funding is set to go ahead, with an extra £1.3bn announced to soften the blow.

The Government has announced it will plough ahead with plans for a new national funding formula, which campaigners claimed could cost Oxfordshire schools almost £30m the coming years.

Education Secretary Justine Greening made the announcement in the House of Commons today, noting the current funding system was ‘unfair, opaque and out-of-date’.

She said: “The additional funding I’m setting out today, together with the introduction of a national funding formula, will provide schools with the investment they need to offer a world-class education to every single child.”

A fresh pot of £1.3bn has been created from savings made elsewhere in the Department of Education, to be split between schools in the first two years of the new formula.

The cash is designed to support schools during the transition period. 

Schools are expected to learn in September how much extra they will get, but Ms Greening insisted the ‘historic reform’ will mean more cash per pupil.

A group called Fair Funding for All Schools Oxfordshire was set up earlier this year, to campaign against the plans for a new formula.

It predicted the plan could cost Oxfordshire schools up to £30m, but has not yet made an updated projection.

The funding formula remains set to come into effect in September 2018, with the transition period to last until 2020.