Agenda item

School Budget Funding 2022/23 Consultation Review

To receive the above report.

Minutes:

The Schools Forum noted the contents of the School Budget Funding 2022/23 Consultation Review.

 

The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children apologised to the forum members for the lateness in publishing the report but explained that this was due to the consultation ending only a short time before the meeting date.

 

The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children said that only 12 schools had responded to the consultation, with around 30 responses usually being received. He asked forum members for suggestions on how schools could be more encouraged in participating in future consultations. 

 

The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children said that schools supported the Looked After Children formula, which was an optional factor. Schools also supported using headroom to fund lump sum allowances. Feedback received mainly from the Secondary sector included whether more pupil-led factors should be considered for use of the headroom.

 

Councillor Hunt asked why 50% of school respondents to the consultation were unsure. Mike Wallace also asked this, and also requested further context and a breakdown of what split of respondents were Primary, Secondary, and Nursery schools.

 

The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children confirmed that there were 2 Secondary schools and 10 Primary schools that responded. He admitted that there was a current sense of uncertainty existing as the results of the consultations had not yet been publicly shared, which could have potentially led to some schools being unsure on how to respond at the current time. He suggested a possibility could be to invite schools to participate again, once more information was available. The Chairman added that this would only be possible once more information was made available from the Department for Education (DfE).

 

The Director of Children’s Services said that the current 2-year picture showed that by the start of the financial year of 2023/24, the local authority would receive £0 from the DfE for school improvement, representing a full removal of the grant, currently being received at £144,000. The proposal put forward by the DfE is that maintained schools should be funding the school improvement service, rather than the DfE paying for it directly.

 

Mike Wallace said that he was unaware of the points that the Director of Children’s Services had made and suggested that therefore schools should be re-approached with some clarity and once they had all the facts, they would hopefully be able to make a definite informed decision.

 

The Chairman noted that the Schools Forum was very academy heavy and said that only 2 members of the forum would be able to vote on behalf of the maintained schools of the whole borough. He therefore suggested that it would be best to defer the decision to the next Schools Forum meeting in January. Mike Wallace welcomed this delay and agreed that he and Chris Tomes did not represent all the maintained schools in the borough wholeheartedly.

 

Isabel Cooke asked if there was an approximate costing that could be given to the forum. The Chairman replied by saying that the cost for the next couple of years was £70,000 for 2021/22 and £140,000 for 2022/23. The Director of Children’s Services confirmed to Isabel Cooke that this would only apply to maintained schools, as academies were already contributing financially to this.

 

The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children stated that £450,000 was currently held within a ring-fenced budget of previously de-delegated funds that had built up over the last few years. He added that in Summer 2022, an exercise would be carried out to delegate this money back to maintained schools. Chris Tomes asked if this money was ring-fenced for maintained schools. The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children confirmed this to be the case.

 

The Chairman asked for the consultation to be distributed to schools for comment before the January Schools Forum to ensure as many responses would be received as possible. The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children confirmed this would happen and added that this would be purely for the school improvement grant element. This was confirmed by the Chairman.

 

Mike Wallace asked for the notice to schools to be crystal clear with the information set out easily, to encourage schools to respond. The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children noted this.

 

Chris Tomes asked if the governance training still came under the school improvement grant. The Director of Children’s Services said that the training would continue and was separate to the school improvement funding.

 

AGREED UNANIMOUSLY: That the decision on the School Improvement grant be brought to the January 2022 meeting of the Schools Forum.

 

The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children said that in terms of the pupil growth fund, the allocation had not yet been received for the next year, but it was anticipated to be less than the current rate. He asked the forum if a vote on the remaining de-delegation rates should be brought back to the January Schools Forum meeting too.

 

The Chairman asked Mike Wallace and Chris Tomes if they would be open to agreeing the first 5 points of section 6 of the report. Both Mike Wallace and Chris Tomes agreed to pass these.

 

AGREED UNANIMUSLY: That the proposed de-delegation rates set out in section 6 of the report be passed along with the existing de-delegation rates for both Primary and Secondary schools.

 

The Head of Finance for Achieving for Children said with reference to the early year’s formula, under the terms of the operational guidance, 95% of the allocation is allocated via formula to the settings with 5% retained for central early years services. This would be the basis for the proposal of the consultation undertaken in January 2022. The forum noted this.

 

The Chairman asked if the forecasted falling numbers of school places in Windsor could be brought to the next Schools Forum meeting. The Director of Children’s Services agreed, however, added that it may have to be the following meeting as the agenda for the January Schools Forum was already quite full following on from decisions made within this meeting.

 

The Chairman agreed this and ended the forum meeting by thanking everybody for their hard work and wishing everybody a happy Christmas and New Year.

 

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