Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent estimate she has made of the number of schools with in-year budget deficits.

The latest available figures show 96% of academy trusts and 85% of local authority-maintained schools are in cumulative surplus or breaking even, with an overall cumulative surplus of almost £6.5 billion, compared to a cumulative deficit of £330 million. These figures relate to 31 August 2024 for academy trusts and 31 March 2024 for maintained schools. In the 2023/24 financial year, there were 1745 local authority-maintained schools in deficit, and 341 academies were in trusts that had an overall deficit.

The department does not hold in-year information on the spending of schools and trusts.