Hugh Robertson defends government’s decision to cut-down sport funds
The UK minister for Sport and Olympics, Hugh Robertson, emphatically favored the government’s decision to cut-down the annual funding of 162 million pounds per annum, which has been reserved for financing the activities of “Network of School Sports Partnerships”. The minister further insisted that instead of government, it was the head-teachers responsibility to seek and arrange the required funding.
Hugh has come up with the aforementioned statement, for extending help to the UK’s economically sinking government but he has been under fierce criticism and huge pressure, for favoring such a hard way of securing the required money. Right after he shared his views, the former Secretary for Culture, Ben Bradshaw inquired from him that whether this decision of the government to scrap school sports partnership would cause a huge damage to an essential part of the Olympics legacy.
Robertson’s statement has been severely under criticism and sports teachers and coordinators have started planning to present a petition, which will carry over one million signatures, to the secretary of State of Education, Michael Gove. However, without realizing the gravity of the situation, while reiterating his point of view, Robertson said,
“I think it is fair to say that nobody who is involved in sports issues would want sports funding to be cut in any way, but we have to realize that this is a decision taken against the backdrop of the fact that this country pays out 120 million pounds in debt interest every day. Schools funding has been ring-fenced and handed over to head teachers, and I would challenge them to continue this funding where it is proving important and showing benefits.”
The minister further said that the school budget was directly given into the hands of the head-teachers, and they were rather free to make their decisions, the way they wanted to. He stated that during the times he had been visiting different schools in capacity of a minister and a member of parliament, he had always heard teachers asking for a greater control over the budgets, and in that context, he hoped the government was transferring the real control into their hands.
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