ONE-to-one tuition for thousands of pupils in the South would be at risk under a Conservative government, Labour has claimed.

Education Secretary Ed Balls said the Tories' refusal to protect spending on schools meant they could not guarantee that the £7.1m Labour has allocated for free personal tuition across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight from September would be safe from cuts.

Under Labour's plans, the cash would be spent on providing extra one-to-one help for more than 17,000 primary and secondary pupils in the region who had fallen behind in class.

Most of the students, who would receive the extra tuition during normal classroom hours, or at evenings or weekends, are aged seven to 13 - but GCSE students in secondary schools struggling to meet exam targets would also benefit.

Mr Balls said: "Any parent who can see their child struggling at school will want to provide all the additional support they can. Labour recognises that some children in the South will need additional support and will introduce a guarantee that any child who needs extra help will receive it. The Tories have opposed these measures and their policies would be a real risk to families in the South."

Mr Balls told a London election press conference that the Conservatives would spend £1.7bn less on education than Labour in the current financial year.

A Conservative Party spokesman said it was "rubbish" to claim that a Tory government would cut frontline school spending - but failed to commit to matching the funding allocated by Labour for one-to-one tuition.

The spokesman said: "Of course we support one-to-one tuition but as the head of the main headteachers' union has said guaranteeing it would create additional bureaucracy for schools taking teachers away from the classroom and leave schools open to expensive litigation through the courts. The Conservative approach is to give all parents the kind of education that currently only the rich can afford."

The Liberal Democrats have claimed that its Pupil Premium - which is designed to provide about £2,500 in additional funding for each secondary pupil on free school meals - would lead to £57.7m extra annual investment in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight schools.