Agenda Item:
THE CUMBRIAN SCHOOLS’ FORUM
Draft MINUTES OF THE MEETING HELD ON
8 September 2014
The Old Court Room, Carlisle
PRESENT
Linda Dean (Barrow Primary)
Jackie Drake (Nursery Schools)
Nick Fish (Copeland Primary)
Jackie Franklin (Non-teaching Unions)
Steven Holmes (Secondary Academy)
Jo Laker (Allerdale Primary)
Chris McAree (Secondary Academy)
John McAuley (RC Diocese)
David Nattrass (Eden Primary)
Nigel Pattinson (Eden Secondary)
Ty Power (Secondary Academy)
Vanessa Ray (Secondary Academy)
Alan Rutter (Teachers’ Professional Associations)
Ian Smith (Copeland Secondary)
Kris Williams (Special Schools)
Officers in Attendance:
Caroline Sutton (Assistant Director – Schools and Learning)
Helen Hamilton (Children’s Services Finance Manager)
Nicola Shiels
(Children’s Services)
Observers:
Duncan Fairbairn, CCC Conservative Group
Tony Wolfe, Leadership Support Officer
Apologies for Absence
Louise Anderton
Anne Attwood
Lisa Balderstone
David Batten
Chris Brooksbank
Anne Burns
Vivienne Halliday
Jonathon Johnson
Michael Mill
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This was a single item meeting to consider the proposed consultation on National School
Reform: Funding Arrangements 2015/16. Schools Forum was asked to consider and review
the consultation document and the associated appendices ready for release to all schools
and Academies on Wednesday, 10 September 2014.
As in previous years, the papers were confidential and were handed out at the beginning of
the meeting. Members were asked to return all papers at the end of the meeting.
1.
Declarations of Interest
Usual rules would apply.
2.
School Funding Reform Consultation 2015/16
The DfE’s final arrangements for 2015-16 were published at the end of July 2014. An
additional £390m was to be added to the Schools Block element of the Dedicated
Schools Grant, with Cumbria estimated to receive an additional £7.8m (based on
October 2013 pupil numbers). Although the DfE had confirmed to local authorities
that the government had no plan to reduce funding after 2015-16 for any local area,
this would subject to the next Comprehensive Spending Review following the general
election in May 2015.
Cumbria County Council has a statutory duty to decide how to allocate this additional
funding to schools through the Cumbria School Funding Formula. In line with School
Funding Regulations, the Council must consult with all schools, academies and the
Schools Forum on this.
Each year, the DfE produce a report detailing the funding formula for every local
authority to enable local authorities to make comparisons. Cumbria’s funding formula
for the 2014-15 financial year compares favourably to other local authorities with the
exception of the overall ratio of primary to secondary funding. Whereas, nationally,
funding per secondary school pupil is on average 27% higher than funding per primary
school pupil, in Cumbria, funding per secondary school pupil is only 15% higher. This
was the rate that ensured the least financial turbulence for those Cumbrian schools
most significantly adversely affected by the funding formula changes.
In order to develop the 2014-15 funding formula, a working group of the Cumbria
Schools Forum, comprising equal membership from both the primary and secondary
sector, was formed and tasked with exploring how the additional funding would be
allocated through the formula, and whether there needed to be changes to the
Cumbria School Funding Formula for 2015-16 to address the balance of funding
between primary and secondary schools.
The working group put forward to the Schools Forum recommendations for the
principles for a funding formula for 2015-16 through which the additional Schools
Block funding for Cumbria would be allocated. The principles were approved by the
Cumbria Schools Forum on 20 June 2014.
On 24 July 2014, after considering the principles recommended by the Schools
Forum, Cabinet decided to consult all Cumbrian schools, academies, and the Cumbria
Schools Forum on the following:
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

That the additional funding in 2015-16 was allocated to secondary schools
through the Basic Per Pupil Entitlement (AWPU) factor to give an uplift to
secondary schools by increasing the primary-secondary funding ratio from 1:1.15
to 1:1.22.
That the principles agreed by the Schools Forum on 20 June are adopted as the
parameters for implementing the School Funding Formula in Cumbria. This did s
not mean that these principles will be implemented in 2015-16 or all at the same
time, but that Cabinet would adopt them as aspirational principles when making
future changes to the funding formula and would introduce them as they become
practicable.
The decision to allocate the additional funding to secondary schools meant that no
primary schools would lose funding.
Subsequent to Cabinet’s decision, the DfE published its final arrangements for 201516. In this, the proposed additional funding for 2015-16 had increased from £350m to
£390m, with Cumbria’s estimated share increasing from £6.7m to £7.8m. The £7.8m
remained subject to change being based on pupil numbers at the October 2013
census. The final allocation would be based on pupil numbers at the October 2014
census. The estimated allocation of £7.8m would increase the primary-secondary
funding ratio from 1:1.15 to 1:1.23.
Sparsity Factor
For 2015-16, the DfE had made a mandatory change to the eligibility requirements for
the sparsity factor. Whereas for 2014-15, eligibility was based on a school’s sparsity
distance and the number of pupils in a school, for 2015-16, the sparsity distance will
still be used but the number of pupils in a school will be replaced by ‘average year
group size’ calculated by taking the number of pupils on roll at the October census
date and dividing by the number of year groups in school. To be eligible for sparsity
funding in 2015-16, primary schools must have fewer than an average of 21.4 pupils
per year group and secondary schools fewer than an average of 120 pupils per year
group. The Local Authority has checked the schools that were eligible for sparsity
funding in 2015-16 and, based on 2014-15 data, this mandatory change has not
impacted the eligibility of any school in Cumbria.
The DfE’s final arrangements for 2015-16 also permited an additional funding
allocation for small, sparse secondary schools. These schools already received
£0.100m sparsity funding through the Cumbria School Funding Formula. However, an
additional £0.050m could be allocated to these schools providing they met the
following criteria:



Have pupils in years 10 and 11
Have 350 pupils or fewer
Have a sparsity distance of 5 miles or more.
As in 2014/15, schools could make an application to the LA where they felt that the
sparsity distance provided by the DfE was not appropriate. The deadline for
submitting these requests was 24 September 2014. As this deadline was prior to the
end of the consultation, it was proposed that the LA assess any applications and
present them to the Chair of the Schools Forum, who under delegated authority from
the Schools Forum would decide which applications to submit to the DfE for approval.
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A separate letter would be issued to schools with the consultation documents setting
out the information regarding the sparsity factor.
De-Delegation and Centrally Retained Budgets
As in 2014/15, the consultation asked maintained schools which budgets should
continue to be de-delegated back to the local authority for 2015/16. The maintained
representatives of the Schools Forum would be required to vote on the de-delegation
of budgets at the meeting on 15 October 2014.
This was an early opportunity for the Schools Forum to have sight of the consultation
document, ask questions and tease out any issues.
The draft consultation document contained 7 questions and schools would be invited
to respond through an online survey. Two appendices would be circulated with the
consultation paper. These would present information for each school on the sparsity
factor and the financial impact for each school of the proposals as set out in the
consultation document. The consultation would begin on Wednesday, 10 September
2014 and all responses should be submitted by Wednesday, 8 October 2014.
Consultation documents would be e-mailed to individual schools and Academies and
be made available on the schools portal. Following the closing date, responses would
be presented to the Schools Forum on 15 October for a recommendation to be made
to Cabinet. Maintained school representatives would also be asked to vote on dedelegated budgets for 2015/16. Cabinet, on 23 October 2014 would then decode on
the School Funding Formula for 2015/16 before it was submitted to the DfE by the 31
October 2014 deadline.
As well as this, any exceptional applications for sparsity factor should be submitted to
the LA for consideration by 24 September 2014. Any exceptional applications, as
agreed by the Chair of the Forum, to be submitted to DfE by 30 September 2014.
The Schools Forum went through each of the consultation questions. A particular
issue of concern related to the application of the minimum funding guarantee and how
this would affect the allocation of the additional funding for 2015/15 to secondary
schools. There were a number of questions relating to this issue. Responding to
these, members of the working group stressed that there had been extensive
discussion, based on detailed modelling before the group had agreed the
recommended principles.
There was also some continues concerns relating the sparsity factor. These issues
were largely the same as issues that had been raised in the previous year. It was
suggested that the consultation document should highlight that sparsity data was very
sensitive to change and include an explanation about how it was calculated.
It was noted that colleagues may not fully appreciate how the minimum funding
guarantee was applied. As a result it might be helpful to add one or two paragraphs to
the consultation document that explained how the MFG was applied and also the
inequities that it could perpetuate.
The Schools Forum agreed that:
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i)
ii)
3.
The consultation document should be released to schools. Prior to it being
released on Wednesday, 10 September, it should be amended to incorporate the
explanations delated above relating to the sparsity factor and clarification of
MFG.
The Chair of the Schools Forum be mandated to agree, on behalf of the Schools
Forum, exceptional applications for the sparsity factor to be submitted to the DfE
by 20 September 2014.
Any Other Business
i)
Question 3 in the consultation document related to the reduction in the range of
‘funding per pupil’ that currently existed between schools in Cumbria within each
phase (primary and secondary) – It was important to ensure that this was
implemented by gathering suggestions about how to take this forward. One
possibility was for a couple of Schools Forum members to work with the Local
Authority on an ongoing strategic plan, to look at in the context of educating
children rather than in a financial vacuum. The Forum was asked to consider this
invitation, one primary, one secondary, one academy and perhaps one nursery.
If any members were interesting in being involved with this piece of work, they
should e-mail contact Caroline Sutton by e-mail.
There were no other items of business.
SL/SAA/NJS
September 2014
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