Agenda and draft minutes

1.              Apologies & Resignations

Apologies were received from the following Members:

Apologies were received from the following Officer:

The following members did not attend and did not give their apologies:

Since the December 2019 meeting Simon Lomax - Nuneaton Academy has resigned from Schools Forum.

It was confirmed that we would continue to hold elections in March 2020 for Schools Forum members rather than undertaking elections now for the vacancies.

Early Years National Funding Formula 2020/21

Neill Butler presented the report.

The report covers 2 issues. Amending the existing rate and applying the additional funding from Government from April 2020

There are 2 rates: the universal rate and the deprivation rate.

Previous assumptions indicated that 1 in 4 pupils attracted deprivation funding.

Over the summer information was provided by the be Early Years Team which suggested that only 1 in 8 pupils attracted the deprivation rate.

This means that from April 2020 the universal rate, deprivation rate or both could be increased.

The Early Years Working Group proposed that the deprivation rate should stay the same and to increase the universal rate which would benefit all Early Years providers.

This would move the universal rate from £3.96 per hour to £4.02 per hour.

In December 2019 the Government announced that is was raising the early years rates by £0.08 per hour. After taking a top slice of 5% this would leave £0.07 to be applied to the universal rate so increasing it to £4.09 per hour.

Nicci Burton:  what is cost for 2 year olds when top slice is taken?  Answer – no top slice for 2 year olds

Sarah Bromley – Will council keep 1p?  Answer Yes will keep 22p/hr instead of 21p.  The additional £0.01 top slice equates to approx. £65k.  Sarah then asked if the council consider not keeping 1p; and passporting the full 8p.  Birmingham passing the full amount. And Worcestershire are retaining 1p for Special Needs provision.

Neill responded by saying that we had considered other options but it was felt that to top slice the whole allocation by 5% was a more consistent approach.

Alison Bardsley – why are the most vulnerable children not getting share of the increase?  Answer: Working group is of view £0.53 is sufficient within deprivation rates.  Base rate is so low, so to increase it goes to all children including those in deprivation.  This is in addition to the Early Years Per Pupil Premium which is more effective factor re deprived children (rather than based on post code).

Neill committed to taking it back to working group.  But can’t delay the decision. 

Proposal is to make a decision on 7p with further decision regarding the 1p to come later

to the March meeting.

Neill committed to taking it back to working group.  But can’t delay the decision. 

In favour – unanimous yes

Action: Neill Butler to take 5% centrally retained funding back to the Early Years Working Group

7.       Schools Block Disapplication Consultation

Jane Carter presented the report.

Nicci Burton asked a question about why we received less than expected.  Jane Carter said she had a response from a DfE advisor and this will be forwarded on. It was calculated on number of factors that don’t benefit the Shire counties.  Eg low deprivation and high attainment – it works against you.  Metropolitans have therefore done better with the extra funding – and have been able to reinstate services that they had previously cut.  We are in the reverse position of this and are struggling to clear the deficit. Only got £4.8m.  So we remain one of the lowest funded authorities and hence why WCC is a member of the f40 Group.

Jane Burrows asked if this is being escalated and taken to National level.  Ian Budd confirmed that it is.

Jane Carter went on to say that the current overspend is £5.4m. Waiting to hear if regulations will change based on consultation.  If LA cannot fund current in year overspend; increases to £11.8m when combine 20/21 overspend.

Jane Burrows asked how likely is it that LA can’t fund 19/20 deficit? Ian Budd responded  – can’t predict and do not yet know when outcome will be confirmed

Last schools forum discussed the 0.5% and disapplication to avoid deadline being missed but Schools Forum were not asked to make a decision on this at that time.  Need to make decision today about withdrawing the disapplication or proceeding with it..

Jane Carter outlined the results of the consultation

·         Response rate improved compared to last consultation.

·         21% response rate.  48 responses out of 230 schools. 

·         43 responses said no 90%

·         4 responses said yes 8%

·         2 responses made no comment 2%

Jane Burrows: do we know if the responses were secondary schools as this would represent higher number of pupils. Neill Butler informed Schools Forum that 11 responses were received from secondary schools and 37 from primary schools. This represented 31% of secondary schools and 19% of primary schools responding to the disapplication consultation

Jane Carter then gave an overview of the comments received from schools:

Ian Budd confirmed that the NFF can be implemented.  So, the last 3 questions on consultation are void, as we can meet the NFF now that we have the final allocation

Ian Budd expressed gratitude for those who take on system leadership roles e.g. schools forum; Task and Finish groups, etc.  and this is a system-wide issue for Schools Forum to consider

Moving £1.7m reduces but doesn’t eradicate overspend

Report from High Needs Task & Finish Group gave detail of patterns of provision in County (Oct report) and talked about plans in short term and medium term. If overspend remains over 1% in 2019/20 we must compile a recovery plan to the DfE.

Ian Budd talked through flowchart and the decision-making process regarding the 0.5%. Ian supported the recommendation to transfer 0.5% to high needs and the fact that the challenge will be £1.7m greater if we  ...  view the full minutes text for item 7.

7.       DSG Monitoring Report 2020/21

Purnima Sherwood presented this report.

Amy Woodward: asked what the £0.528 million overspend on ABP in paragraph 4.2? Jane Carter said she would confirm what this related too.

Clive Sentence: raised concerns over the underspend on admission as this needs to be spend as the service is in danger of imploding.

Decision:

SF agreed unanimously to carry forwards Growth Fund underspends to the following year.

Central Schools Services DSG Budget Allocation 2020/21

Purnima Sherwood presented the report

Jane Burrows: Asked why paragraph 2.3 suggested pupil led funding was going down whilst pupil number had been said to be going up in other agenda items. Becky Robinson to follow this up.

F40 – have a fair funding conference in March for anyone interested. This was circulated earlier today to SF.

Time and Date of the Next School’s Forum

1:00 pm – 4:00 pm, Thursday 19^th March 2020, Northgate House Conference Centre, Warwick