Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much his Department has allocated for special needs provision in schools in Barnsley in each year since 2010.

Local authorities are required to provide schools with sufficient funds, up to the value of £6,000, to enable schools to meet the additional cost of pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). This funding comes from the schools block of the Dedicated Schools Grant.

When the costs of additional support required for a pupil with SEND exceed £6,000, the local authority should also allocate additional top-up funding to cover the excess costs. This top-up funding, as well as funding for special schools, comes from the local authority’s high needs budget. On 17 December 2018, we announced an additional £250 million in high needs funding across the current financial year and the next financial year, bringing Barnsley’s total high needs funding to £22.2 million in 2018-19.

In 2013, the schools and high needs budgets within the Dedicated Schools Grant were created. As the Dedicated Schools Grant includes other budgets such as the early years budget, the department is unable to provide comparable figures before 2013-14.

The schools and high needs allocations for Barnsley since 2013-14 are as follows: