Asked by: Chris Philp (Conservative - Croydon South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much school funding for Croydon there has been in each of the previous 10 years; how many pupils there have been in such schools in each of those years; and what estimate his Department has made of the (a) funding and (b) pupil numbers for schools in Croydon in 2019-2020.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The revenue funding allocated for schools for each financial year from 2009 to 2019 for Croydon local authority are shown in the attached table. For financial year 2019-20, only the dedicated schools grant (DSG) has been allocated at this time, though this makes up the bulk of schools funding. The DSG for Croydon this year is £339.3 million. Other grants will be allocated at later points in the year.
Asked by: Chris Philp (Conservative - Croydon South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of areas in which savings could be made in the school system to increase expenditure on teaching.
Answered by Nick Gibb
In July, we announced that we will be investing an additional £1.3 billion in core schools and high needs funding across 2018-19 and 2019-20, in addition to the schools budget as set out in the 2015 Spending Review. This additional investment in core schools funding will be funded in full from efficiencies and savings from within the Department's budget, as we believe strongly that this funding is most valuable in the hands of head teachers and principals. We have already announced savings of £700 million from our capital budgets, primarily from delivering the free schools programme more efficiently and scaling back the Healthy Pupils Capital programme to reflect reductions in forecast revenue from the Soft Drinks Industry Levy. We are in the process of identifying the remaining savings.
There is scope for schools to improve their levels of efficiency, and to find savings on their non-staff expenditure which can be reinvested into frontline teaching. Our analysis indicates that if the 25% of schools spending the highest amounts on each category of non-staff expenditure were instead spending at the level of the rest, this could save over £1 billion. The Department will continue work to deliver the initiatives set out in the Schools’ Buying Strategy (published in January 2017), to help schools deliver the best value for money from their non-staff expenditure and secure these savings.
Asked by: Chris Philp (Conservative - Croydon South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the level of financial reserves held by schools in England is.
Answered by Nick Gibb
We are delivering the biggest improvement to the school funding system for well over a decade and our national funding formula will create a fairer system.
We trust schools to manage their own budgets with the great majority having a cumulative surplus of funds, built up over a number of years. The latest published figures for England’s schools showed an overall cumulative surplus of more than £4 billion (for schools with a cumulative surplus), against a cumulative deficit of less than £300 million.
We continue to provide support to schools to help them use their resources in the most efficient way, so they can deliver the best value for the taxpayer.
Asked by: Chris Philp (Conservative - Croydon South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what comparative assessment her Department has made of the proportion of the schools budget that has been spent on staffing costs in (a) 2010 and (b) 2017.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Spending on staff as a proportion of the total schools’ budgets has decreased from 77% in 2011/12 to 74% in 2015/16 for academies and from 77% in 2009-10 to 73% 2016-17 for local authority maintained schools.
In July 2017 we announced an additional £1.3 billion of funding for schools and high needs across 2018-19 and 2019-20, in addition to the schools budget as set out in the 2015 Spending Review. This means funding per pupil for schools and high needs will be maintained in real terms for the next two years.
Asked by: Chris Philp (Conservative - Croydon South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what comparative assessment she has made of how far pupils travel to attend (a) existing grammar schools and (b) non-selective secondary schools (i) on average and (ii) for those 10 per cent of pupils travelling the furthest to attend grammar schools.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government is committed to enabling all children to fulfil their potential by delivering a school system that works for everyone.
The Department has assessed how far pupils travel to grammar schools based on the school attended. This shows that the median distance travelled to school by pupils attending grammar schools is 3.1 miles compared to 1.1 miles for pupils attending non-selective secondary schools. The same analysis shows that for pupils travelling the furthest to attend schools – those in the top 10% in terms of distance travelled to school – the median distance travelled for those attending grammar schools is 13.3 miles compared to 6.2 miles for pupils attending non-selective secondary schools.
These figures are based on pupils and schools attended in the Spring School Census 2015 and cover all pupils attending mainstream schools in years seven and above. Distances are calculated as the straight-line distance between pupils’ home postcode and the postcode of the schools attended.