Kenton School teachers issue 'no confidence' vote over trust

Dozens of posts are expected to be lost at Kenton School in the months ahead

Teachers at one of Newcastle's biggest schools have issued a vote of no confidence in the trust running it.

Staff at Kenton School are facing redundancies as the school manages a £356,000 budget deficit.

About 40 teaching and support staff roles are expected to be lost in the coming year.

Kenton Schools Multi-Academy Trust, which took over the school in 2012, said the financial difficulties are linked to national funding cuts.

Siobhan O'Neil, the trust's chair, said: "Kenton school is projected to have lost in terms of funding over £700,000 by 2020.

"And this year we had a 2% increase in some of the pay scales that wasn't predicted, so we hadn't budgeted for that."

'Caring people'

Joe Waddle, of the National Education Union, said: "Suddenly everybody is worried about their position, about their futures and about their families.

"And being caring people, they're worried very much about the effect this is going to have on the curriculum and their students."

Ms O'Neil said: "I understand that people are anxious and in some cases angry, but we have to deal with the financial position.

"We have had signed off by the Education and Skills Funding agency a really robust recovery plan."

The school has 2,000 pupils, including 300 in the sixth form.

The trust also runs the Studio West School in Denton, Newcastle.