Sir – It was interesting to read your front page of May 28, just prior to the elections, where the management of school budgets and their attendant surpluses and deficits was rehearsed.

The council warns that schools may face future budget difficulties, and that schools in less prosperous areas were even now starved of funds compared with those in the more advantaged. A new funding formula is suggested, possibly redistributing funds towards greatest need to help narrow the attainment gap between rich and poor.

Perhaps this timing was intended obliquely to explain away the under-performance of our schools alongside those in similar authorities? Or perhaps to distract us. A check on the DCSF website shows that in absolute terms (2007-08) secondary-school figures), with unspent balances approximately 2.4 per cent of income, Oxfordshire was a prudent fourth of 11 authorities; DCSF regards a five per cent surplus as the limit of acceptability.

If we look at the ‘spread’ of balances, measuring (crudely) the difference between the average deficit for over-spent schools and the average surplus for under-spent schools, Oxfordshire ranks sixth of 11. Just eight of our 34 schools hold excessive balances (>5% of revenue), and we rank fourth best. Over these three measures combined (prudence, rationality and equitability), we rank fifth.

In short, our financial management is better than our schools' performance.

Rather than dire warnings, unspecified plans and the distracting foment between schools about balances, I would have been more interested had councillor Mitchell set out a vision and strategy for school improvement, showing what was to be done, with what resources, by when . . . and had promised some accountability, to boot.

As he and Ms Tomlinson know, I have been suggesting such a discussion for some time, and had even included fair funding among the topics for debate.

Councillor, Ms Tomlinson?

Peter Martin, Bampton