To review the Dedicated Schools Grant high needs budget for 2019/20 and recommend to the cabinet member children and families any necessary adjustments in the Pupil Referral Service charges to schools and SEN support services to schools.

The strategic finance manager (SFM) gave an overview of the report and highlighted the following key points:

·        The main focus of changes to the high needs budget for 2019/20 involved the pupil referral service;

·        Over the following two years it was proposed the pupil referral unit (PRU) transition to providing 50 places for permanently excluded pupils, funded by the council, and 30 discretionary places to be purchased as required by schools;

·        The changes would lead to savings to be delivered on a phased basis over the three year period;

·        There would be an increase in the PRU top up fee to £6,700 for all students from September 2019;

·        Further work was needed on the detail of arrangements for the PRU and the packages that would be available for schools to purchase, this was ongoing with Herefordshire Association of Secondary Headteachers (HASH);

·        It was proposed that an intervention fund be established from September 2019 to support schools with meeting the needs of students, the operation of this fund would be subject to consultation with HASH and would support the in year fair access panel;

·        A collection of changes were also proposed to SEN support services to achieve savings of £110k in 2019/20 and further savings in future years, the budget working group had asked for further detail on these savings which was now included in the report at paragraph 14;

·        Allowance had been made in the proposed budget for growth in numbers of  post 16 pupils, out of county independent special school placements and in county special school places;

·        Projections for the next three years showed that the high needs budget was expected to remain in surplus until 2021/22 but this would require support from schools to continue to transfer surplus funds from the schools block;

·        longer term changes to high needs funding could arise from the government’s comprehensive spending review and any future changes in DfE policy;

·        proposals for work on early intervention would be taken to the budget working group in May 2019, with a report back to the forum in due course, the proposals would consider how to invest to prevent further cost pressures arising while maintaining statutory services;

·        analysis of secondary rolls suggested that it might be appropriate to establish a SEN protection scheme for secondary schools similar to that in place for primary schools, this would cost approximately £60k per annum which would need to be funded, there were at present one or two secondary schools with higher than average numbers of SEN pupils;

·        the high needs budget proposals would go forward to the cabinet member children and families for a decision, any comments from the forum would be included in the report.

The PRU representative on the forum commented on the proposals for changing the service. She thanked the SFM for the time spent on preparing for the change. A working party had been established, including representatives from secondary schools, to oversee the changes and work towards a viable model.  The PRU had seen  ...  view the full minutes text for item 30