An MP will meet the leaders of a primary school in Gerrards Cross after it warned that it may be forced to make ‘disastrous’ staffing cuts due to a lack of funding.

The Gerrards Cross Church of England School faces a funding deficit of £128,000 for 2023-24, forecast to rise to £170,000 and £177,000 over the next two academic years.

Amid ballooning staff salaries and pension rises, the academy has been forced to slash costs by increasing class sizes, cancelling forest school and scaling back music lessons.

However, these measures alone are not enough, according to the chair of governors Leanne Tilley, who warned that the school may now have to cut staff as well.

In a letter to Joy Morrissey, the Conservative MP for Beaconsfield, Ms Tilley wrote: “We have never been in a deficit position like this before.

READ MORE: Man bulldozing his south Bucks mansion for new one

“It means we are now faced with a future where we cannot provide the children of Gerrards Cross with the high-quality education they have been receiving.”

Ms Morrissey, whose constituency includes Gerrards Cross, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service that she would meet with the school.

In a statement, she said: “I will always do all I can to support our local schools to be successful and I meet regularly with local head teachers and governors.

“I will arrange to meet with the school to understand the issues they are facing and how I can help them.”

Ms Tilley claimed that ‘continued underfunding’ by the Conservative government would ‘negatively impact educational provision for our pupils’.

She said the school, which has 421 pupils, had also considered corporate sponsorship, although it may be prevented from doing this by its articles of association.

The chair of governors ‘implored’ Ms Morrissey to meet with education secretary Gillian Keegan in a bid to encourage her to provide additional funding for the government-agreed teachers’ salaries and pension increases.

Ms Tilley wrote: “If these items continue to go unfunded, you may find that not only our school, but many schools in Buckinghamshire, and indeed the country, are forced to make staffing cuts which will inevitably reduce the quality of teaching.

“This would be disastrous for our children and country, and I cannot believe any government would want that scenario.”

The school says that increases in teacher pension contributions from employers have not been fully funded and that increased energy costs of around £40,000 were not reflected in its academy funding.

It added that an increase of around £120,000 in its teacher salaries was reflected by the fact that ‘all its staff are long since fully qualified and highly experienced, meaning their salary costs are significantly higher than an average teacher’.