The Liberal Democrats have announced that they will spend £10 billion a year more on schools and hire 20,000 more teachers by the end of the next Parliament.

This is great news for Esher and Walton, particularly as figures from the National Education Union show that next year (2020/21), schools in our constituency will have seen their budgets cut by nearly £974,000 in real terms since 2015, once increasing pupil numbers are taken into account.

This is equivalent to a cut of £104 per pupil across the constituency. Yet Dominic Raab continues to claim that he is delivering an increase in school funding.

I strongly believe that young people across Esher and Walton deserve world-class schools and colleges so they can get the best start in life.

Across the country, hundreds of schools rely on handouts from local parents or cut staff numbers to make ends meet. Some schools nationally are already shortening the school day because they can’t afford to keep children at school for a five-day week and some in our constituency have considered it.

Cuts in school funding are compounded by the cuts to local authority budgets which provide mental health and special educational needs support to schools and families too. In Elmbridge, demands on the SEND budget have increased 55% with no increase in funding.

As the next MP for Esher and Walton, I will fight to reverse school cuts so that our children can get the resources they need to learn. Back the Liberal Democrats and, by stopping Brexit, we can spend £10 billion a year more on schools and recruit 20,000 more teachers to give every child the skills they need to succeed in life.