In July 2023, following the announcement of the 6.5% teacher pay award, the DfE announced that it would be providing additional funding of up to £40 million as further support to schools in particular financial difficulty.
Further details have recently been published on how this funding will be administered, with 35 local authorities (LA’s) set to receive a share of £20 million. The department has confirmed that £20 million will be distributed to those LA’s that have the most significant maintained school deficits. LA’s with aggregated school-level deficits above 1% of their total maintained schools’ income will receive funding in proportion to the overall total of their aggregated school-level deficit.
The guidance states that eligible LA’s are “able to use this funding to support best their schools in the individual circumstances in which they find themselves’’ with “significant flexibility over how this funding can be used.’’
The remaining £20 million will be used to top up the existing financial support available to academies in financial difficulty.
It has been confirmed that “this is one-off funding available in 2023 to 2024 only, and the department has no plans for similar additional funding in 2024 to 2025.’’
