A ROW has erupted between the county council and a teaching union over the total number of teaching posts that could be lost by September.Martin Goold, county secretary of the National Union of Teachers, has claimed 120 teaching jobs and 100 non-teaching jobs across Suffolk will be lost by the start of next term because of financial pressures.

A ROW has erupted between the county council and a teaching union over the total number of teaching posts that could be lost by September.

Martin Goold, county secretary of the National Union of Teachers, has claimed 120 teaching jobs and 100 non-teaching jobs across Suffolk will be lost by the start of next term because of financial pressures.

He has accused Suffolk County Council of being "too timid" in dealing with the problem and said it had failed to inform the Government of the real crisis affecting education in the county.

But the county council said it was only aware of 20 full-time posts in 13 schools that could be lost, as schools were only required to inform them if they were planning to make redundancies.

Mr Goold said: "The Government thinks Suffolk has nothing to worry about because we've not been explaining to central Government that there are these job losses.

"I think they have been too timid. They need to be making sure Suffolk's needs and situation is explained forcefully to the Department for Education and Skills."

But Tony Lewis, a member of the county council's executive committee, said the NUT had not raised these figures during a meeting between the council and teaching associations.

"We have explained to Martin that schools are only required to inform us if they are planning to make staff redundant," he said.

"Therefore we are only aware of less than 20 full-time equivalent posts in 13 schools that may be lost through redundancies, and that these are all schools that are affected to some extent by a fall in their pupil numbers."