Eastern Cape schools win battle over underfunding claims

75% of school funding allocations ‘unconstitutional, unlawful and invalid’ Delivering judgment, Judge Thembekile Malusi said: “The decision of the first, second and third respondents, communicated to public schools in the Eastern Cape in May 2023, to withhold 33.“It is declared that paragraph 114(b) of the Amended National Norms and Standards for Public School Funding (published in Government Notice 869 of the Government Gazette 29179, 31 August 2006) sets out the prerequisites with which a provincial education department must comply before it may lawfully provide less than the target per [pupil] allocations to schools in the province.“The decisions taken by the first, second and third respondents between 20 November 2020 and November 2022, to reduce the per [pupil] funding allocations for public ordinary schools in the Eastern Cape to an amount less than the targets determined by the fourth respondent from time to time, are declared unconstitutional, unlawful and invalid.