Yesterday, Monday 23 September, a council Schools Forum was held at Kingston Guildhall.

Chaired by Ash Ali, head teacher at Chessington Community College and chair of Every Child Every Day, the forum looked at 2024/25 finance updates, the 2025/2026 budget, and cluster budgets.

A mixture of headteachers, school governors, and staff from various education services all joined the Forum.

Much of what was discussed during the forum expanded on the outcomes of the previous Schools Forum on 17 July 2024.

The first item discussed was on finance updates from 2024/2025.

During the July 2024 Forum, the panellists discussed the DSG Budget in the 2024/25 Financial Year, the current projected DSG for the 2024/25 financial year, and whether to introduce a Falling Rolls Fund in 2024/25 using the 2023/24 underspend on the Growth Fund, being £171,794.

In yesterday's forum, Collette Cartwright, Head of Finance at Achievement for Children explained that "Since the last forum, the government has announced additional funding for the teachers pay award and support staff pay award, but this extra funding is not the full 5.5% for teachers and an estimated 3.4% for support staff- it's the difference between the increases and what the councils deem schools can afford at 3%.

"Teachers get 3% and support staff get 1%."

She said: "The overspend since the last forum in the early years block and high needs block has reduced by £200,000 partly because of the early years block changes to the actual funding- they've taken in the latest census data- and within the high needs block its due to the imports and exports adjustments.

The Schools Forum were asked to consider and agree:

• Whether to introduce a Falling Rolls Fund in 2024/25 using the 2023/24 underspend on the Growth Fund - £171,794?
• If yes, what criteria should be used to fully distribute the fund to eligible schools?

The forum voted yes for this question and agreed to implement the Pupils Admission Numbers (PAN) methodology for one year.

It agreed that any school that has 5% of their permanent PAN that's not full will get compensation from the new falling roles pot.

Next on the list of discussion was the 2025/26 budget.  

Lucy Kourpas, Chief Operating and Finance Officer at Achieving for Children, began the discussion by saying: "There's been very few announcements coming out from the department of education over the summer, which makes things harder.

"The mayor has announced the £3 per meal rate for free school meal for primary schools."

She explained that she is waiting on information regarding free school meals in infant schools, which has been delayed to autumn.

The Forum was asked to consider the consultation responses and approves;

• Kingston and Richmond Safeguarding Children Partnership – Safeguarding Training for academies via an SLA (academies only).
• Schools Block de-delegated budgets (maintained schools only).
• 2025/26 Central Schools Services Block budgets (all schools).
• Targeted High Needs Fund and associated funding from the Schools Block.
• School improvement activity and associated funding from the Schools Block.
• Funding for cluster budgets and associated funding from the Schools Block.
• Primary Alternative Provision and associated funding from the Schools Block.
• Secondary Alternative Provision places and funding options.

Schools block transfers relate to maintaining schools, academies, and primary and secondary phase schools.

Schools were asked to consider re-prioritising funding from the Schools Block (schools delegated budgets) for the following borough wide priorities:

• Targeted High Needs Fund.
• School Improvement Activity.
• School Cluster Budgets (new).
• Primary Phase Alternative Provision.
• Secondary Phase Alternative Provision (Malden Oaks).

De-Delegated Budgets

Maintained school's representatives on Schools Forum are required, on an annual basis, to agree whether they wish to receive services funded by de-delegating funding to a central budget. Kingston currently utilises three de-delegated service categories, including:

• Safeguarding Training (£8,235).
• Education Inclusion Support Service (EISS) -previously known as Behaviour Support (£282,846).
• Support Services for Vulnerable Pupils - previously known as Underperforming Ethnic Minority Groups and Bilingual Learners (£137,783).

Any underspend within the de-delegated budgets is returned to the Dedicated Schools Grant (Schools Block) and may only be used by maintained schools or may be carried forward with Schools Forum consent to offset against future pressures.

Maintained schools were consulted on proposed de-delegated budgets for next year and the findings are detailed in the Schools Forum Agenda. The Forum was asked to approve the de-delegated budgets for 2025/26.

Funding for training delivered via the Kingston and Richmond Safeguarding Children Partnership (KRSCP)

A request was received by the council  from the KRSCP for schools to consider setting aside funding, at the same level, again next year to support safeguarding training delivered to schools.

At present the partnership invoices all academies through a service level agreement, and maintained schools contribute via de-delegation.

Academy School Forum members were asked to vote on whether they wish to formally write to all academies to recommend that all academy schools sign up to an SLA with a total estimated value across academy schools of £10,589.

School level allocations will be based on pupil numbers. Eleven academies or academy trusts responded to the consultation and ten said yes (91%), and one said no (9%).

Targeted High Needs Fund

Schools were asked to contribute the reduced amount of £200k towards the Targeted High Needs Fund in 2025/26 following a decision last year by the Forum to start to phase down the value of the fund over time.

The current 2024/25 fund was agreed at £300k with a view to decreasing this by £100k per year until 2027.

The majority of schools voted in favour of the continuation of the Targeted High Needs Fund.

School Improvement Activity

Schools were asked to contribute £130k towards the borough wide school improvement activity in 2025/26.

This amount has been uplifted by 3% to reflect the pay award.

This is an estimation whilst the council awaits confirmation of the actual local government pay award.

Overall, schools voted in support of the continuation of funding for the school improvement activity.

Secondary Phase Alternative Provision - Malden Oaks

Malden Oaks provides full time education for secondary aged students who cannot attend a mainstream school.

Typically, students are at risk of permanent exclusion, have been permanently excluded or have been referred by the admissions service as they require a school place, but their needs cannot be met in a mainstream setting. Students are often awaiting an EHC needs assessment.

In 2012, the amount allocated for each of the 44 places was £18,850 and this was broadly in line with statistical neighbours.

The amount per place was reduced to £14,850 when Malden Oaks expanded to offer places to Richmond pupils as fixed costs were spread over a higher number of places.

Malden Oaks is facing similar inflationary pressures as other schools and the rate per place has not been increased for a number of years.

The headteacher presented a paper to Schools Forum in July 2024 explaining that the current rate is no longer sustainable and an increase to £16,500 or 11% was required to create a financially sustainable budget model.

Given the well documented pressures on the high needs education budget this level of increase can not be afforded within the high needs block and so schools were asked to consider and vote for alternative options:

• Option 1 - A block transfer of £74,250 from the schools block (school delegated budgets).
• Option 2 - Reduce the number of available places from 45 to 40.
• Option 3 – Other suggestions.

The overall support from schools is in favour of option 1 - a transfer of £74,250 from the schools block. There were no suggestions for alternative funding solutions.

The forum voted in favour of option 1.

The forum unanimously voted in favour of funding in all these areas, apart from the High Needs Block as Ali suggested that this block does not need improvement.

Finally, the Forum discussed Cluster Budgets.

The forum questioned whether schools in the borough need a new cluster and decided that if so, there would need to be a Cluster Budget leader in each school, being either the school's headteacher or a specialist in cluster spends.

Who would become the leader is to be decided by each independent schools.

The Forum looked at two options for funding for clusters and cluster leaders:

Option 1: One cluster with a budget of 100k and an additional 25k for the cluster leader.

Option 2: One cluster with a budget of 100k on cluster and an additional 50k for two cluster leaders.

The forum unanimously voted in favour of option 1, opting to provide £100k for the cluster budget and £24k for each school's headteacher.

Ali suggested that clusters should be reviewed each year.

He said: "For every pound it costs we've got to save 20p, right?"

The next Schools Forum will be on 19 November 2024.