ONE billion pounds meant for schools was not spent by the Government last year, it has been revealed - just days after Swindon Council was accused of failing to pass on £2.3m.

Now head teachers have accused ministers of hypocrisy and demanded the money is released to solve the cash crisis facing schools.

Education Secretary Charles Clarke has given Swindon's education chiefs until next Monday to explain why the £2.3m has failed to reach head teachers.

He warned that teachers could be axed just because authorities were holding back vital cash. Now it has been revealed that Mr Clarke's own Department for Education and Skills had a massive £1bn underspend last year the biggest in Whitehall.

The £1bn pot is almost twice the total of £590m that local education authorities have been accused of allowing to go missing.

Michael Keeling, head of Even Swindon Infants School and deputy chair of the Swindon Association of Primary Heads, said: "This is hypocrisy, I don't know what to say."

Swindon education authority has already accused Mr Clarke of getting his sums wrong, insisting that it had put in extra cash for schools by raising the council tax.

Dick Mattick, Swindon secretary of teachers union the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers , said: "It seems a case of the pot calling the kettle black. If there is that much money I hope Government will set an example and get it to schools."

A Department for Education spokesman said £300m of the £1bn underspend was tied up in building projects that had been delayed.

Julia Drown, Labour MP for South Swindon, also insisted that most of the £1 billion had never been intended for individual schools.