- If the 2020 budgets are approved, EUR 757 million will be allocated to Education, adding to the line of the Department of Education the corresponding to University. In total, 77 million more will be invested than last year in Education, an increase of 12% compared to 2019. This rise seems to be applauding, but it is regrettable, as a deeper reading shows.
First of all, it should be noted that the weight of Education will drop in these budgets from 17% in 2019 to 16% of these budgets.
On the other hand, Navarre’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will be no more than 3.6% of the Education line, still far from the 6% recommended by UNESCO, as well as the 5% mentioned in the programme agreement of this Government. Reaching only 5% by 2023 requires an annual increase of 0.4%, with only an increase of 0.27%. In particular, an additional EUR 38 million is needed to fulfil this commitment.
In addition, we would like to see enough money to implement the agreements of the Pact for the Improvement of the Quality of Public Education of Navarra, but at the last Pact Follow-up Commission of 15 January, it was clear that the amount available is only intended to pay what has been achieved thanks to the long negotiation and union mobilization during 2019: to reduce the school hours of teachers and to pay the grade of seniority and summer. However, for the time cuts agreed by age, in some studies of diffusion of the Basque country (Vocational Training, Artistic Teachings, Adult Teaching, among others), among others, there is no fixed salary for the adaptation of the centers due to the climate emergency.
These are not social budgets, let alone. If these budgets are to have a real social character, as the Government claims, more investment in Education is needed.
Finally, the rise in the first cycle of Early Childhood Education (0-3) shows us that: For the Public Children's Schools it is about one million, while for the concerted centers it is five million more than in 2019. The government should first allocate public money to finance public services to ensure the universality and gratuitousness necessary for the most important period in the training of people. Instead, one more year, we see that the privileges of the private network increase. These are not social budgets, let alone. In order for these budgets to have a real social character, as the Government calls for, more investment in education is needed. It is now time to demonstrate the responsibility of the Department of Education with regard to Public Education, demanding the financial amount necessary to comply with all the measures signed in the Covenant. Because this year’s rise is not enough to comply with the agreements that should already be in force, let alone those that need to be put in place for the next year.
Finally, Steilas again calls for urgent action: The Law on the Financing of Public Education, which devotes 6% of Navarre’s GDP to Public Education, with which we will only manage not to depend on the political and economic vicissitudes and obtain the necessary resources in a sustained way.
Uxue Lasa Villa
Araceli Montes Calvo
(STEILAS Union)