Agenda item

To receive and consider the results of the consultation with schools.

At its last meeting the Forum had requested to review in more detail questions 9, 15, 20 and 24 of the 2015 school’s funding consultation.  The report on pages 21-32 of the Agenda provided details of the responses.

Donna Munday pointed out that the final Proforma submission would be sent on 20 January 2016, therefore members still had the opportunity to discuss and make any changes if they wished to.

Members discussed the introduction of a cap to contribute towards Minimum Funding Guarantee (MFG).  Donna stated that the average MFG per pupil value was higher than it was four years ago; however costs had increased at a greater rate.  The decision as to where the cap would be would be taken would be made at the January meeting.

Members debated Question 9 which related to the Looked After Children’s (LAC) rate of funding.  The consultation response was tied with 50% voting for £900 and 50% voting for £1,900.  The draft Proforma was based upon a rate of £900.  To have increased the rate would have meant “finding” a new £1,000 per pupil.  As there was no appetite to reduce funding in any other area the draft Proforma had remained at £900.

Donna explained that Schools Forum was not bound by the Consultation responses and could decide on different figures from the results. 

Members felt that there was no evidence that increasing the LAC funding would achieve better results but there was consensus that the funding should remain at £900.

Donna confirmed that it was expected that MFG would continue at 1.5% for next year.

There was much debate over the increased costs and the fact that most schools would face difficulties in balancing their books in the future. It was recognised that the High Needs Funding was out of date and members felt this would have a negative impact in schools with potentially more children being excluded as their needs would not be addressed.

In response to a question Donna stated that the redundancy pot available from the Local Authority was £37K and it did not come out of DSG.  This was only available to maintained schools.

A member asked what help was available to schools facing financial difficulties.  Donna responded that the Local Authority offered advice on contracts, placements, budgeting and HR.  There were regular meetings with schools where there was an opportunity to talk to Officers.

Rob Stubbs, Head of Finance suggested that schools worked together as much as possible to generate savings.

Some members of the Forum questioned the cost of running the Virtual School for Children In Care (CIC). They were informed that there was no extra costs as the professionals involved had taken this as an extra responsibility, Alan Stubbersfield pointed out that the Local Authority was required to have a Virtual School and this provided a valuable service. 

The Forum went on to discuss Question 15 – Introduction of a split site factor.  Derren Gray, Headteacher of Charvil Piggott and Piggot explained that the two schools were located two miles apart but because it was an “all through school” he received one lump sum for both schools. Derren stated that when it wasfull the Charvilpart of the school received 23% less than if it was aseparate school.  Derren declared that this was unsustainable and he would not be able to run Charvil Piggott beyond next year if funding remained the same.  Derren requested the introduction of a split site factor to help to solve this problem.  Derren drew attention to the fact that there were greater costs in running the schools in two different sites.

It was noted that to introduce a split site factor would incur in a reduction of other factors funding as the overall funding available was fixed.  There would be only one school in the Borough that would attract the funding.

Members discussed the implications of introducing the split site factor, how other schools may fall into this situation in the future and how this would affect the budget.  The Forum felt that before a decision was made it would be useful to do some benchmarking to find out how other schools in different areas dealt with this situation.

The Forum decided to defer the discussion on Questions 20 and 24 to the next meeting.

RESOLVED That: the report be noted and that information on split site factor benchmarking be brought back to the Forum for consideration.