Five more local authorities are in talks to join a controversial Department for Education special educational needs and disability funding bailout programme, Tes has learned.
There are currently 34 local authorities (LAs) that have agreements under the Safety Valve programme with the DfE. Tes understands that a further five are getting ready to submit final proposals to the DfE next week to secure the funding, after being invited by the department to join the programme late last summer.
The Safety Valve programme is an intervention targeted at the LAs with the highest Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) deficits. Under the deals, the DfE gives LAs capital funding and cash to wipe out their deficits in return for agreed measures aimed at reforming their SEND provision.
The bailout programme is part of a range of government measures aimed at reforming support for pupils with SEND amid rising costs. Concerns have been raised that these measures will aim to “effectively ration education, health and care plans (EHCPs)”.
The five local authorities are Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP); Cheshire East; Wiltshire; Devon; and Bracknell Forest.
BCP was invited to apply to the Safety Valve programme in July 2023, despite having already been listed as a recipient of support for councils with less severe deficits under the Delivering Better Value (DBV) in SEND programme, along with Cheshire East, Bracknell Forest and Wiltshire.
The DfE is expected to approve the five council plans and publish details in March if they are satisfactory, according to a letter sent by the department to BCP.
SEND funding bailout scheme
Councils had previously been expected to submit draft proposals to the DfE last month.
At a meeting in December before the draft plan submission date, BCP set out two scenarios for balancing the Dedicated Schools Grant funding.
Its first scenario sets out a plan that proposes to balance the DSG in five years as per the Safety Valve programme expectation, including transferring 0.5 per cent of schools’ funding to high-needs budgets annually over the course of the five-year bailout programme.
To achieve this, BCP forecasts it would have to reduce its EHCPs to an average of 20 new plans a month from April 2024. Currently, the LA averages 60 new plans a month, though this does include backlog cases.
It also assumes no new exclusions from April 2024 or escalation of plans when they are reviewed annually, according to the BCP minutes.
This scenario’s assumptions were judged to be unrealistic and unlikely to provide a good service, including by a DfE SEND adviser, a report from a council scrutiny meeting on the 3 January states.
The council’s second proposal to secure the Safety Valve funding - which was eventually submitted as its draft to the DfE - makes “potentially deliverable but very challenging” assumptions, the report states.
It assumes reducing new EHCPs to 30 a month by 2024-25, with that target reducing by one a year.
This scenario would not balance the DSG in five years, instead maintaining a gap of around £23 million by year five and then balancing it over 15 years, the proposal outlines.
The council did note in the December meeting that it was doing further work to establish if it could obtain funding from other sources, such as the schools block of the DSG or from excess maintained school balances.
However, it said it would need a transfer of 11 per cent from the schools block to close the projected gap for 2024-25.
BCP’s corporate director for children’s services, Cathi Hadley, told Tes that it has not yet been able to come up with a plan that would balance the budget within five years.
She added: “Work to achieve this is ongoing and no decisions on funding have been made. Discussions of scenarios and some of the exploratory work to achieve the right proposal is a normal part of our democratic overview and scrutiny process, but these discussions do not mean that we are committed to any specific cuts or changes to funding.”
Meanwhile, Wiltshire Schools Forum supported Wiltshire Council submitting its final Safety Valve plan by the January deadline at a meeting in December. This plan included a 0.55 per cent transfer of funding from the schools block of the DSG to the high-needs block.
And Cheshire East Council accepted the DfE’s invitation to start Safety Valve deal negotiations in September.
Bracknell Forest Council’s executive director for people, Grainne Siggins, told Tes that the council’s draft proposals had input from the Schools Forum, representatives for headteachers and local stakeholders, building on what other areas had learned from the programme.
Legal concerns
The councils’ proposals come after concerns were raised last year over the legality of measures proposed by local authorities in support of the bailout funding.
The Independent Provider of Special Education Advice (IPSEA) wrote to LAs with Safety Valve deals last July, asking them to confirm they would comply with their legal duties to pupils with SEND.
It raised concerns that Safety Valve deals would affect council decisions about whether a young person needs an EHCP, and restrict access to provision.
The number of EHCPs being issued has been growing over the past few years, with 66,706 new plans issued in 2022 - up 7 per cent from the year before.
In a December briefing on the Safety Valve programme, Bracknell Forest Council stated its forecast cumulative deficit of £24.1 million was “primarily caused by a large growth in pupils” with EHCPs.
The DfE and the five LAs were contacted for comment.
