THE county's top education campaigner has criticised Gordon Brown's pledge that he will put state school pupils' funding on a level with what private school pupils receive.

Parent campaigner Helen Donovan said the differences that already existed between funding for Worcestershire pupils and top-funded pupils in other counties would make it difficult to achieve the aim in the county.

Her comments come after the Chancellor's keynote address to the Labour Party conference in September.

Mr Brown promised to spend an extra £2,500 per state school pupil from £5,500 now per pupil to today's level for private school pupils of £8,000 per pupil a year."

His promise has been welcomed by Martin Hird, the GMB union's senior regional officer for public services in, who said: "The pledge to match funding per pupil in private schools is a very important and very welcome commitment to state school pupils and their parents in the West Midlands."

Figures show Worcester-shire lies 13th out of 14 counties in the West Midands in terms of funding per pupil.

Students in the county get £3,710 per pupil, compared to the highest-funded authority, Birmingham, which gets £4,550 per pupil. This compares to a national average of £4,130 and a West Midlands average of £4,040.

But Mrs Donovan said it seemed unlikely these figures could be brought into line with those of pupils attending private schools.

"He had better go and talk to his friends down at the DfES, because as it stands at present it is going to take an increase of £420 per pupil per year to get the Worcestershire payment up to the national average mark," she said.

"And a whopping £840 increase per year to the Worcestershire payment would be needed to match that of our better-funded neighbours Birmingham, before he even can even begin to try and raise it to that of the private schools funding."

Mrs Donovan said only the top 11 funded authorities, which were all based in London, got the quoted £5,500 per pupil annual funding.

"I will be very interested to see how Mr Brown intends to achieve this, considering the huge disparities that already exist nationally in per-pupil funding between the lowest and highest funded authorities, with many getting nowhere near the claimed £5,500 and some receiving as little as £3,680 in our own West Midlands group," she said.

Revenue funding per state school pupil in West Midlands local authorities during 2005-06 was as follows: West Midlands average, £4,040; Birmingham, £4,550; Wolver-hampton , £4,310; Sandwell, £4,280; Stoke-on-Trent, £4,210; Coventry, £4,200;Walsall, £4,090; Here-fordshire, £3,970; Telford & Wrekin, £3,940; Shropshire, £3,860; Dudley, £3,820; Warwickshire, £3,790; Soli-hull, £3,710; Worcester-shire, £3,710; Staffordshire, £3,680.