Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government how many schools in England and Wales they estimate will have a cash terms reduction in their budget for 2018–19, compared to 2017–18.

Through the national funding formula (NFF) the government is giving every local authority in England more money for every pupil in every school in 2018-19 and 2019-20.

The attached table illustrates how much each school is attracting under the NFF in 2018-19, 2019-20 and under the fully implemented NFF. The first tab provides information on how to look up the NFF for a specific school and the NFF data for all schools. The spreadsheet and NFF data is also available on GOV.UK at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/644809/Impact_of_the_schools_NFF.xlsx.

The Department has always been clear that local authorities remain responsible for determining schools’ final budget allocations in these years, in consultation with their schools. All local formulae must contain a Minimum Funding Guarantee (MFG) to limit the losses schools can see year on year. Local authorities have had the flexibility to set the MFG between -1.5% and +0.5% per pupil.

The Department understands that many local authorities have decided that the right thing to do is to replicate the national funding formula locally, including setting the MFG to pass on the minimum 0.5% per pupil increase in full to their schools. We support and encourage this. A school’s overall budget may also decline if it has fewer pupils year on year.

The Welsh Government is responsible for schools funding in Wales.