Two Tayside councils have not received a penny from a flagship Scottish Government war chest to help close the attainment gap.
Shock new figures show that Perth and Kinross and Angus have received no support from a cash pot designed to help the poorest students.
They were among almost a dozen councils to receive no money from the SNP administration’s Attainment Challenge Fund a situation Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale said would lead to a “postcode lottery” in education.
The Scottish Government insisted closing the attainment gap was a “key priority”.
Ms Dugdale, speaking on a visit to Newcastle, said: “I want every young person to get the best possible start in life.
“That means cutting the gap between the richest and the rest in our classrooms but right now it is a postcode lottery.
“More than 1,500 schools in Scotland get no extra support from the SNP Government to cut the attainment gap, and neither do one third of our councils.
“Nicola Sturgeon said education would be her number one priority but in parts of the country she is doing nothing to help.
“The SNP budget will just make things worse, with £500 million of cuts to local councils for services like schools.
“A Scottish Labour Government would ask those lucky enough to earn over £150,000 a year to pay a little bit more in tax so we can create a Fair Start Fund to invest in our young people.
“It’ll mean £1,000 of extra funding for every pupil from the poorest background, and we’ll give the money directly to head teachers, who know how to spend the money better than a minister sitting in Edinburgh.”
A Scottish Government spokeswoman said “removing the barriers preventing our children from realising their potential remains our key priority”.
She added: “Early literacy and numeracy are being improved by the Read, Write, Count campaign which ensures every child in primary one to three has access to a library of books and educational materials with our national and local numeracy hubs and Making Maths Count programme building on this for children of school age.
“Our commitment to closing the attainment gap has seen the number of young people from the most deprived communities leaving school with no qualifications at level 3 or better drop significantly.”