Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether extra funding is available for schools with pupils who have Fetal Valproate Spectrum Disorder.

Local authorities allocate extra funding to mainstream schools through their local funding formula to allow them to support children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), including those with Fetal Valproate Spectrum Disorder. Schools can attract further funding for those with complex needs from their local authority’s high needs budgets.

For children with Fetal Valproate Spectrum Disorder who are educated in special schools, funding also comes from the local authorities’ high needs budgets.

In the 2022 Autumn Statement, my right hon. Friend, the Chancellor announced that the core schools budget, including funding for both mainstream and high needs schools, will increase by £2 billion in 2023/24 and £2 billion in 2024/25, over and above totals announced in the 2021 Autumn Budget and Spending Review. This will bring the core schools budget to a total of £58.8 billion in 2024/25. Within this, high needs funding will be rising to £10.1 billion in 2023/24. This represents an increase of over 50% from the 2019/20 allocations. This extra funding will help local authorities and schools with the increasing costs of supporting all children and young people with complex SEND.