Press Release
27th April 2000
A £325 million funding package for Further Education Colleges in Scotland, announced yesterday by the Scottish Further Education Funding Council, has been hailed by MSP for Greenock and Inverclyde, Duncan McNeil, as a "boost for the lifelong learning revolution."
The funding allocations to Scotland's 47 FE colleges cover teaching support and bursaries for the new academic year beginning this autumn, representing over 90% of the funds made available to the Council this year for distribution to colleges.
The £325 million funding package represents an increase of 8% over last year's comparable allocations, and means a cash increase for all colleges. Allocations for bursaries are 12% higher than in 1999-2000.
Mr McNeil, a member of the Scottish Parliament’s Enterprise & Lifelong Learning Committee, said:
"If we are serious about fighting poverty and ensuring Scotland's future economic prosperity, we must promote further education. This increase in funding is well above the rate of inflation and underlines the Scottish Executive's commitment to helping further education colleges play a major part in widening access to education and lifelong learning.
"This record-breaking funding will also help to stabilise the financial health of the colleges repairing previous under-funding, widen access to further education, and support investment in capital infrastructure and information technology.
"In return, colleges are expected to develop more effective partnerships with local enterprise companies, local authorities, employers and others, and to make a positive contribution to local strategic and economic development initiatives.
"Colleges, such as our own James Watt, also have a vital role to play at community level. The Executive expects them to work closely with local councils, voluntary organisations and others to ensure that issues such as adult basic education and other efforts to improve social justice are driven forward.
"Today's announcement also represents a significant milestone, since this is the first funding round managed by the Scottish Further Education Funding Council.
"The council has made rapid progress since taking on its full responsibilities last July, particularly in determining a new forward looking method of allocating grants.
"I pay tribute to the hard work of its members and staff in tackling its new funding responsibilities."
ENDS
Notes:
Mr McLeish announced on 30 March the allocation of £351.165 million for the 2000-2001 financial year to the Scottish Further Education Funding Council for grants to Scotland's FE colleges. This allocation represents an increase of £28.4 million, or almost 9% on funding available to colleges in 1999-2000, and an increase of around 20% over the past 2 years.
The Scottish Further Education Funding Council is making a separate announcement today of detailed allocations of grant for the 2000-2001 academic year to individual colleges totalling around £325 million. The Council will allocate the remaining balance in the coming months.
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