Completed petition The Additional Pressures on Funding for Education Provision Faced by Sparsely Populated Rural Areas

We, the undersigned, call upon the Welsh Government to recognize the financial challenges of providing an appropriate level of educational provision in sparsely populated rural areas. Spending cuts are adversely affecting school communities to the extent that children are leaving their county of residence (and increasingly, in border counties, such as Powys, leaving Wales) in order to continue their education. Schools and sixth forms are at breaking point, exhausted by continual threat of closure. Our children are forced to travel unsustainable distances on minor roads, breaking up friendship groups and adding up to two hours to the school day. Nursery education is now also under threat, and with continuous cuts to school budgets causing round after round of redundancies, it is impossible to deliver the quality of education that teachers trained for and that our young people deserve. We urge the Welsh Government to immediately investigate the additional challenges to education in sparsely populated rural areas, and to increase the funding to areas such as Powys accordingly. The loss of our schools heralds the death of our communities and our local economies. If a devolved Wales is to thrive, we need our Government to lead the funding discussions in Westminster. We need you on our side!