Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what additional funding his Department has allocated to the deep cleaning of schools as a result of covid-19.

Schools will continue to receive their budgets for the coming year as usual, regardless of any periods of partial or complete closure. That will ensure that they are able to continue to meet their regular financial commitments.

We are also providing additional funding to schools, on top of existing budgets, to cover unavoidable costs incurred due to the COVID-19 outbreak that cannot be met from their existing resources. The fund is targeted towards the costs we have identified as the biggest barrier to schools during the period of partial closure and includes additional cleaning costs required due to confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases, over and above the cost of existing cleaning arrangements.

Schools can claim up to a maximum amount that will depend on their size and will be no more than £75,000 per school. The total amount of funding we provide for additional cleaning will depend on the individual claims made by schools.

Guidance on this additional funding is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-financial-support-for-schools/school-funding-exceptional-costs-associated-with-coronavirus-covid-19-for-the-period-march-to-july-2020.