Agenda item

Claire White introduced the report, which set out the December settlement and calculation of the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) in 2018/19 and the current budget position for each of the funding blocks. Claire White highlighted that the settlement amount for Early Years and part of the High Needs settlement was provisional and the budgets for these blocks would need to be set using estimates. Funding would be based on data from the January 2018 census.

Table one under section four of the report set out the funding that would be received for each funding block. Appendix A to the report contained further information on the funding calculations and Appendix B showed the overall DSG budget per service for 2018/19.

There was an estimated deficit for 2018/19 of £1.5 million and reports later on the agenda would look in more detail at each of the blocks.

Claire White reported that section five on the Schools Block set out how the funding for the block was calculated. There was £97.700m available to be allocated out to schools as per the formula principles agreed by the Schools Forum in December 2017 (and since approved by the Council’s Executive on 18^th January). Although with the agreement of the Schools’ Forum, and subject to consulting with all schools, up to 0.5% of the total schools block funding could be transferred to the high needs budget or other funding blocks, no transfer from the schools block was being made in 2018/19. This enabled West Berkshire to move straight onto the national funding formula.

Claire White moved onto the Central Schools Services Block. A new formula was in place to determine funding allocations to local authorities. Without additional transitional protection funding the budget would amount to £771,245.  As West Berkshire’s funding under the formula was less than the current funding for these services in 2017/18, the unit allocated per pupil included transitional protection. Actual funding therefore for 2018/19 would be £992,560, going down to £967,871 in 2019/20 assuming the same pupil numbers.

There was currently a shortfall of £336k in the Central Schools Services Block and this was largely due to West Berkshire being a small local authority. Many larger local authorities were reporting a surplus in this block and some areas had transferred money to other blocks, for example the High Needs Block.

Regarding the Early Years Block, the new Early Years formula was introduced in 2017/18. The funding rates for 2018/19 remained the same, despite continued concern that the premises element of the area cost adjustment for West Berkshire used for three and four year olds was too low. Claire White reported that Councillor Lynne Doherty had helped to set up a meeting with the Department for Education (DfE) so that these concerns could be raised. This had taken place last week and as a result the DfE were going to review how the area cost adjustment for West Berkshire had been derived. If an error emerged then the DfE had stated they would correct the issue. It was hoped that the DfE would review how the data was used next time around. More detail on the funding for Early Years would be known once the data from the January 2018 census was available.

Jonathan Chishick asked why costs in the area of Early Years had increased so much and Claire White reported that this was due to the increase from 15 hours to 30 hours of free nursery provision for three and four year olds of working parents, introduced by Central Government in September 2017.

Section eight gave a brief summary on the High Needs Block Budget. Under the new formula for the High Need Block, West Berkshire would receive less than the current High Needs Block allocation. However, all local authorities would gain a minimum of 0.5% over their baseline.

RESOLVED that the Schools’ Forum noted the report.