Agenda item

The Schools Forum considered a report (Agenda Item 6) which set out the current position of the services funded by the Dedicated Schools Grant, highlighting any under or overspends forecasted at month 10 of the 2015/16 financial year.

At the end of January 2016 the total DSG overspend position forecast for year end was £602k, compared to the month 9 forecast of £495k overspend, all in the high needs block. 

The Schools Block was expected to be largely on-line. Any under spends in the growth and falling rolls fund (contingency) budget, primary schools in financial difficulty budget, and other de-delegated services would be ring fenced and carried forward to 2016/17 and would not impact on the overall position of the DSG.

Although Month 10 monitoring was showing no variance on the early years block, the latest forecast using data from the January census was that there would be a large under spend as the actual number of hours of provision being funded had not seen a significant increase in year as expected. Furthermore, the number of children the Council was to receive funding for in year (an average of the two January censuses) was greater than the actual number of children accessing early years provision. 

The High Needs Block anticipated overspend had increased since month 9, mainly due to reaching agreement with the two special schools on additional place funding where they have admitted pupils over their allocated places. The pressure of new placements in non West Berkshire Special schools, mainly Thames Valley Free School, and top ups at the PRUs remained.

In addition to the £604k overspend on the high needs expenditure budget, the budget for this block was set £127k over the actual grant available. This means that £731k would need to be met from the 2016/17 allocation of DSG.

RESOLVED that the report be noted.