Families braced for more pain as autumn statement extends cuts

This age of austerity is starting to look interminable. Chancellor George Osborne’s autumn statement this month signalled a bleak outlook for families between now and 2015, particularly those on the lowest incomes and benefits, who will be hit by real-terms cuts in welfare spending.

Central government budgets are also being raided – in part to pay for capital investment in schools.

Whitehall departments will face reductions of one per cent in 2013/14 and two per cent in 2014/15. At the Department for Education, this equates to £155m savings in the next financial year and £305m the following year.

The Department for Communities and Local Government budget will be protected next year, but will be subject to a two per cent cut, equivalent to £445m, in 2014/15. Youth services and children’s centres, some of the worst hit by cuts to council spending so far, look set to be slashed further.

The government has pledged to protect the schools budget, so the children and families directorate at the DfE is likely to shoulder the bulk of reductions, at a time when the number of staff in the department is due to be cut by a quarter.

The education select committee warned just last month that the department risks neglecting children’s policy at large, in increasing its focus on purely schools and colleges.

National Children’s Bureau chief executive Hilary Emery says children are being hit disproport­ionately by cuts to benefits and services “yet again”, adding that the government must urgently rebalance its austerity programme and fund services for children and young people other than schools.

She says: “It is essential that in next year’s spending review, the government invests in other services that offer vital support.”