A FRESH breakthrough in Worcestershire's poor school funding could be around the corner, it has emerged.

Your Worcester News can reveal how top Whitehall civil servants held confidential talks with campaigners yesterday afternoon about giving the county another schools cash boost.

The negotiations, which included Worcester MP Robin Walker and members of the f40 campaign group, led to mandarins doing a set of complicated calculations about a possible "substantial" percentage uplift in cash for this county.

The city MP also held personal talks with education secretary Nicky Morgan earlier this week to press his case.

The negotiations, which are now likely to be on hold until after the General Election, follow a House of Commons debate on Monday where Mr Walker asked ministers to look at the situation afresh.

Back in April last year the Government agreed to shake up its school allocations which gave Worcestershire an extra £6.7 million for 2015/16 as part of a £390 million boost to the UK's worst-funded local education authorities.

But pupils in neighbouring Birmingham still get more than £1,000 a year extra per head than Worcestershire, and at the time the Coalition suggested it would need more time to reduce the disparity further.

Mr Walker said: "The civil servants we met with were very keen to work closely with us and we even had council finance officers there as they went through the calculations.

"From what they were saying, and looking at I can say Worcestershire would get a substantial uplift, but we will have to wait until the election outcome first.

"But even having the talks really is a big step forward in terms of recognising there has to be a push to make this happen.

"Where you live should not determine the quality of education that is available to you.

"We have some fantastic schools in Worcestershire and some brilliant teachers but for far too long they have been labouring at a disadvantage."

During the parliamentary debate on Monday he asked schools minister David Laws what progress is being made on delivering "fair and transparent" funding changes.

Mr Laws cited the £6.7 million boost for Worcestershire this year, and insisted more changes would take place "in the next parliament".

"We have already made the first big step and I agree with him that it is vital we deliver a full solution to this long-standing injustice," he said.