FEARS over the future of children's education have driven dozens of parents in Oxfordshire to join forces in an attempt to secure more cash for schools.

Worried by union claims that the Department for Education's new funding formula – plus other financial pressures – could cost schools in the county £26m by 2019, they have come together to call for more cash.

The newly founded local branch of the Fair Funding For All Schools pressure group has already attracted the support of about 60 parents.

In the coming weeks members hopes to grow and hold a public meeting with Oxfordshire's six MPs to push for an intervention that they claim is needed to protect subjects, teachers and school buildings.

Helen Brockett, whose son Adam attends Carswell Community Primary School in Abingdon, helped to set up the group.

She said: "There is a lot of worry about this, there are a lot of concerned parents out there and they are voters as well.

"It is not just parents, it is grandparents as well and I think everybody in the country is concerned about how children are treated.

"If there are not enough teachers or if other things are cut then are children's goals going to be affected?

"Are children going to be able to reach their potential if there is not enough investment?

"Whether you voted Tory or not they said they would protect education funding and this does not feel like they are."

Fair Funding For All Schools said the £26m estimate is the equivalent of 704 teaching jobs being lost in Oxfordshire and equates to £325 less per pupil.

A consultation on the Government's new funding formula ends on March 22 and the group hopes it can encourage parents to make their feelings known before then.

Fellow Carswell Primary School parent Emma Jackson, whose son Ben is in Year 3, said: "I am really worried it could mean teaching assistants or special needs support being cut.

"It's also a worry looking forward to secondary school because some schools are having to cut subjects, so will children have the same options at A-Level?

"Carswell may be one of the least badly hit but we do not want to only lose a bit at the expense of other schools losing much more."

The launch of the parents' group came as Oxfordshire County Council's education scrutiny committee expressed concerns yesterday about the new funding formula.

The Oxford Academy headteacher Niall McWilliams warned that schools ran the risk of having to drop subjects from the curriculum as they could no longer afford to offer them.

Chairwoman of the Oxfordshire Schools Forum Carole Thomson told the committee: "They keep saying they have protected core funding - but that is very misleading.

"What they have done is cut around the edges and passed more costs on to schools, through cuts to councils, national insurance changes and the apprenticeship levy.

"We are getting to the stage where there are more pupils in the system but the amount of funding is the same, so we are going to be slicing the cake more thinly."

The parents group wants people to make MPs aware of the strength of feeling about the issue by writing to them ahead of a public meeting, which it hopes can be held shortly.

It would bring parents together with elected representatives and teaching unions.

The Department for Education said Oxfordshire as a whole would gain money from the new funding formula.

It has previously called union claims were 'irresponsible scaremongering'.

Spokeswoman Jessica Ware said: "The system for distributing that funding across the country is unfair, opaque and outdated.

"We are going to end the historic post code lottery in school funding and under the proposed national schools funding formula, more than half of England’s schools will receive a cash boost.

"In Oxfordshire, funding would go up by 1.3 per cent, over £4.6m, if the proposed new funding formula was implemented."

To find out more Fair Funding For All Schools visit facebook.com/fairfundingforallschoolsoxfordshire.

To complete the consultation visit consult.education.gov.uk