盡管英國首相布朗保證將力頂政府在教育方面的投入，英國財政部的最新文件表明，明年英國在教育方面的政府撥款將下降1億英鎊。此次批露的數據也首次體現了政府財政緊縮帶來的實際影響。排除通貨膨脹的因素，2010至2011年，在教育方面的支出將從今年的851億到減為850億英鎊。

雖然削減的金額非常有限，但有可能會引起頗多爭議，因為這是20年以來首次在教育方面政府的投入有所減少。而本周三，布朗還表示政府要力保公共服務不受經濟危機的影響。

英國財政部的發言人并不認同這是政府削減撥款，因為政府已經將一些明年的投入提前到位，比如政府將2010-11年的30億經費用于支持經濟復蘇和在伊拉克與阿富汗的維和工作。同時，根據獨立顧問的分析，英國政府明年通過開源節流，將有望節省出50億的經費，這為保護重要服務和產業提供了資金的基礎。

Education spending to be cut by ￡100m

Despite Gordon Brown pledging to safeguard spending on schools and universities, government documents show that the total education budget will fall by ￡100 million after the next election. The disclosure is in statistics that detail the true scale of the Government’s budget reductions for the first time. According to the figures, which are adjusted for inflation, total education spending will fall from ￡85.1是billion in 2009-10 to ￡85 billion in 2010-11.

While the cut is small in terms of the total budget, it is highly symbolic because it would be the first such drop since at least the late 1980s. Only on Wednesday, the Prime Minister insisted that spending on key public services would be safeguarded.

A Treasury spokesman said that the reductions should not be classified as “cuts”, since spending had been brought forward from subsequent years’ budgets. “It is ridiculous to suggest that the Government is planning cuts in defence spending or overall spending next year,” he said. “We have brought forward ￡3 billion of spending from 2010-11 in order to support the economy now and spending on operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. On the basis of findings of independent advisers, the Government also announced in the Pre-Budget report that it would make ￡5?billion of efficiency savings next year, protecting funding for frontline services.”

（Source: Telegraph，英國使館文化教育處提供）