Agenda item

RESOLVED:

1.               That the 2016/17 funding formula for Surrey schools be prepared on the basis of:

(i)       continuing the £10 million transfer of Dedicated Schools Grant from the notional Schools block to the High Needs block first introduced in 2015/16

(ii)      transferring an additional £1.65 million from the Schools block to the High Needs Block and

iii)   transferring £1.65 million from the County Council to the DSG High Needs Block.”  

2.        That the Cabinet approves the recommendation of the Schools Forum to reduce schools’ deprivation funding to 7.79% of total schools’ formula funding in 2016/17

3.        That the proposed Surrey formula factors for 2016/17 as set out in Annex 4 are approved for submission to the DfE by the 30 October deadline

4.         That authority is delegated to the Assistant Director, Schools & Learning, in conjunction with the Leader and the Cabinet Member for Schools, Skills and Educational Achievement to update and amend the formula as appropriate following receipt of the DSG settlement and updated DfE pupil data in December 2015. This is to ensure that total allocations to schools under this formula remain affordable within the council’s DSG settlement to be announced during December 2015.

Reasons for Decisions:

To ensure that spending on crucial Special Educational Needs services is maintained despite the vote of the majority of schools responding to the County Council’s September 2015 funding consultation, and the subsequent decision of Schools Forum only to recommend a transfer of £10m from the Schools Block to the High Needs Block. Decisions on the proposed Surrey schools funding formula are required in order to comply with DfE regulations requiring notification of the council’s funding formula by 30 October 2015.

[The decision on this item may be called in by the Education & Skills Scrutiny Board]

The Cabinet Member for Schools, Skills and Educational Achievement began by saying that in each of the past 4 years when she had presented the schools funding formula report, it had been a process that involved the complex figures that make up schools funding being understood, and with the combined support of Schools Forum and Surrey Officers, the recommendations had been approved after a brief discussion.

She went on to state that this year’s report on proposals for the Schools’ Formula Funding for 2016/17 was quite different and had been arrived at after a great deal of debate and consideration by both the schools community and officers and there had been and still was a large measure of disagreement between schools on 2 key areas of the funding formula which were covered in the report, the level of Deprivation funding and the extra special educational needs funding allocated from the Dedicated Schools Grant which the Department for Education (DfE) made to Surrey schools.

She referred Members to the pack of consolidated responses from schools to the Funding Consultation in September reminded them that they had also been copied or had sight of correspondence from many schools, which included those on both sides of the Deprivation Funding debate.

She provided the following information:

·        The Dedicated Schools Grant for general schools funding, totalled £583 million with £49 million for Early Years. 

·        The High Needs Block of £127 million funded pupils with special educational needs and disabilities and other SEND support services. 

·        That Surrey spent quite highly on special educational needs for a variety of largely historic reasons, and accepted that the Council had been slow to implement programmes to bring down this spending. 

·        That the £127 million High Needs Block was frozen by the DfE last year and Schools Forum agreed to transfer £10 million to it from the general Schools funding for 2015/16.

She went on to say that whilst it had been expected that this additional £10 million of funding could be reduced for 2016/17, the consultation document circulated to all schools last month requested a transfer of £13.3 million next year to the High Needs block, net of £2.2 million of planning savings that would be made, as a result of demographic growth, inflation, and changes in the entitlement of young people aged 16-25 with special educational needs.  She said that the consultation document had also suggested cuts which would need to be made to SEN support services if Schools Forum did not agree to the additional transfer for 2016/17 and also asked schools to suggest services which they would be prepared to see cut back although no such proposals were in fact received. 

She referred Members to the proposed savings needed to maintain the additional level of funding from schools at £10 million which were set out in the submitted report and said that these covered a range of important special needs support services, particularly the special schools outreach service which was accessed by around 200 Surrey schools.

She asked Members to note that, of the 219 responses received from schools around 60% of those, both primary and secondary schools, had voted to maintain the additional High Needs Block funding to £10 million, but from the stream of correspondence received from schools over the past few days, the actual cuts needed seemed to have caught them unawares.

Mrs Kemeny asked Members to consider the detailed Equality Impact Assessment prepared to cover the possible cuts in SEN funding in Annex 5 of the submitted report.  She said that it was of great concern to see that nurture groups, learning support units, Pupil Referral Units, Learning & Language staff, and Outreach Services, particularly for Speech & Language and Autism, could all be lost if schools could not afford to buy them back, and these services support some of the most needy and vulnerable children in the county including Looked After Children.

She then moved onto the subject of Deprivation funding and said that Surrey currently allocates £61 million for additional Deprivation funding (10.8% of total formula funding).  She asked Members to note the difference between the total sum of £583 million the total of £564.3 million in the table.  The difference of £19 million includes the additional £10 million transferred to the High Needs Block, plus the admissions service, funding for growing schools and service costs totalling around £9 million. She informed Members that it was a fact, that the national median is 7.79% and Surrey ranked 42^nd highest of 142 local authorities, however many local authorities had significantly higher basic funding to support their deprivation.  She stated that Surrey’s basic funding was much lower, and the comparison was stark particularly compared with adjacent London boroughs. 

She informed Members that prior to the DfE’s introduction of a new funding formula in 2013, Surrey had operated a tiered funding method which targeted deprivation funding where it was most needed. She explained that both she and the Leader had written to the Secretary of State for Education seeking to return to tiered deprivation funding and officers have met with DfE officials to discuss this. She said that the DfE were unwilling to consider this at present but Surrey was continuing to press for a fairer approach where there are significant pockets of deprivation alongside more affluent areas. 

She explained that Deprivation funding supported the Council’s aim to close the attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and all other pupils. She referred to the fact that at the moment Surrey does not appear to be collecting all of the pupil premium it could – for pupils entitled to free school meals and that Surrey collected around £27 million which officers estimated was about half the amount the county is entitled to and more should be to be done to persuade more parents to apply for free school meals whenever they met the criteria. 

She highlighted the following points:

·        The suggested reduction in deprivation funding from 10.8% to 7.79% amounted to a reduction of £9.8 million for primary schools and £7.2 million for secondary schools.

·        From the Summary of Schools’ Responses, it could be seen that 33.3% of primaries and 55.6% of secondaries had voted for a reduction to 7.79% in line with the national median.

·        That due to the minimum funding guarantee set by the DfE and in place for 2016/17, schools could only lose up to 1.5% of their total funding next year.  There was no certainty that this cap would remain in place after April 2017, so any additional reductions above 1.5% could effectively be rolled over and applied in future years.

Mrs Kemeny signposted the Equality Impact Assessment that covered the effect of such a reduction in deprivation and stated that schools already faced a real terms reduction in funding in 2016/17 meaning that schools in deprived areas would inevitably feel this more. 

She summarised by saying that she somewhat reluctantly agree with the proposal to reduce schools’ deprivation funding to 7.79% of the total schools formula funding for 2016/17 on the basis that the loss of funding is capped at 1.5% for the year and that the County Council would continue to lobby government hard on a fairer deprivation funding criteria. She said that schools must work harder to ensure that as much pupil premium as possible is collected, and the County Council would help with this campaign.

The Leader of the Council confirmed his support to lobby government on the issues with deprivation funding and stated that he would urge government to look at this again on behalf of Surrey schools.

The Deputy Leader said that it was a sensitive issue with a difficult decision to be made. He agreed that a tiered funding formula would be the best option for deprivation funding and that the Schools Forum had worked to try and reach a consensus. He stated that he took comfort in the fact that no school would lose more than 1.5% and that the county must look to increase the amount of pupil premium.

The Cabinet Member for Business Services and Resident Experience said that it had never been more complex and difficult and that although she was happy to support the proposals she didn’t understand why the Council was involving itself at all. The Cabinet Member for Schools, Skills and Educational Achievement replied that the Council had a legal duty in this situation.

The Cabinet Associate for Children and Families Wellbeing queried why the costs of Special Educational Needs seemed to keep rising to which Mrs Kemeny replied that the Council had fallen into a pattern of non-maintained provision for SEN and that this was very costly. She referred to the increased pressure from the 16 to 25 year old group and that it would take time to recognise the additional responsibility with no additional funding provided.

The Cabinet Member for Highways, Transport and Flooding commented on the effect of Surrey being close to London and the comparative levels of funding received by other neighbouring authorities.

The Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care asked if the decisions being taken applied to academies or only to Surrey maintained schools and was informed that the basic funding per pupil was no different.

Mrs Lewis reflected on the pupil premium available to schools and suggested that the Council should make a concerted effort to encourage more people to sign up to free school meals.

The Deputy Leader referred to the 2 Equality Impact Assessments and how these had been read very carefully and it was very important to take note of these.

RESOLVED:

1.               That the 2016/17 funding formula for Surrey schools be prepared on the basis of:

(i)       continuing the £10 million transfer of Dedicated Schools Grant from the notional Schools block to the High Needs block first introduced in 2015/16

(ii)      transferring an additional £1.65 million from the Schools block to the High Needs Block and

iii)   transferring £1.65 million from the County Council to the DSG High Needs Block.”  

2.         That the Cabinet approves the recommendation of the Schools Forum to reduce schools’ deprivation funding to 7.79% of total schools’ formula funding in 2016/17

3.         That the proposed Surrey formula factors for 2016/17 as set out in Annex 4 (appendix 5) are approved for submission to the DfE by the 30 October deadline

4.         That authority is delegated to the Assistant Director, Schools & Learning, in conjunction with the Leader and the Cabinet Member for Schools, Skills and Educational Achievement to update and amend the formula as appropriate following receipt of the DSG settlement and updated DfE pupil data in December 2015. This is to ensure that total allocations to schools under this formula remain affordable within the council’s DSG settlement to be announced during December 2015.

Reasons for Decisions:

To ensure that spending on crucial Special Educational Needs services is maintained despite the vote of the majority of schools responding to the County Council’s September 2015 funding consultation, and the subsequent decision of Schools Forum only to recommend a transfer of £10m from the Schools Block to the High Needs Block. Decisions on the proposed Surrey schools funding formula are required in order to comply with DfE regulations requiring notification of the council’s funding formula by 30 October 2015.