Schools: Coronavirus

(asked on 28th September 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, when his Department plans to disburse the additional funding and grants for costs associated with the covid-19 outbreak claimed for by (a) Eversely Primary School and (b) other schools.


Answered by
Nick Gibb Portrait
Nick Gibb
This question was answered on 1st October 2020

The Department is providing additional funding to schools, on top of existing budgets, to cover unavoidable costs incurred between March and July due to the COVID-19 outbreak that cannot be met from their existing resources.

Schools have been eligible to claim for: increased premises related costs associated with keeping schools open over the Easter and summer half term holidays; support for free school meals for eligible children who are not in school, where schools are not using the national voucher scheme; and additional cleaning costs required due to confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases, over and above the cost of existing cleaning arrangements.

The first claims window for the COVID-19 schools fund closed on 21 July. There will be a further opportunity in the autumn for schools to claim for exceptional costs that fell between March and July. This second claims window will be available for schools who were unable to claim in the summer and will be for the same eligible cost categories.

Schools have claimed £104 million against the standard expenditure categories in the fund, as set out above. The Department will be making further payments in the autumn term to schools who either claimed outside of the standard categories or whose claims exceeded the cost limit, following an assessment of their claims. Along with other schools who made a claim outside of the standard expenditure categories, Eversley Primary School, Enfield, will receive a payment in the autumn term which will reflect the outcome of that assessment.

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