Agenda item

The Committee considered the report of the Corporate Director of Resources that provided details of the forecast outturn budget position for Children and Young People’s Services highlighting major variances in comparison with the budget for the year, based on the position at the end of quarter three December 2022 (for copy of report, see file of minutes).

The Finance Manager was in attendance to present the report.

Mrs A Gunn referred to special schools’ provision and asked how much a placement cost and how many children the £1.2 million related to.

The Finance Manager responded that an average special school place cost between £20,000-£23,000 per place and they had around 1600 children in special schools within Durham. Whilst they had an overspend in terms of the higher needs budget, they had prevented costs in terms of out of County Durham placements which would be £60,000-£70,000 if they were an independent school. By providing more places withing County Durham at a lower cost they were spending more money than in the grant allocation but were preventing spending more on those independent places outside of County Durham.

The Head of Early Help, Inclusion & Vulnerable Children indicated that the growth in demand was adding pressures in terms of spends but the special schools were on track for that period and the biggest area of spending was top up funding for children in mainstream schools.

Councillor L Mavin asked for confirmation that a special school placement was still £10,000 base rate plus top ups or if the base rate had increased.

The Finance Manager responded that the base rate was still £10,000 but there was an addition to the base rate of £660 but this was to cover teachers’ pay award.

Councillor C Hunt asked what measures were being taken to reduce the home to school transport costs.

The Head of Early Help, Inclusion & Vulnerable Children indicated that a report went to Cabinet a couple of months ago and stated that the consultation had just concluded, and a further report would be submitted to Cabinet June or July with a number of proposals based on the consultation to help control costs of home to school transport.

Mrs A Gunn stated that it would be helpful to know the engagement for that consultation and how they were reaching those groups and if it reached all those groups of children who were receiving those services.

The Head of Early Help, Inclusion & Vulnerable Children responded that this could be something to consider as part of the work plan of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

Councillor R Charlton-Laing stated that she had attended a meeting where they talked about the Council’s digital strategy and in that meeting, she mentioned that surveys and consultation were hard to access and the website was hard to navigate and that it should only take you two clicks to reach your destination, so there should use this strategy for consultations.

The Head of Early Help, Inclusion & Vulnerable Children advised Members that he would pass on the comments to consultation colleagues.

The Principal Overview and Scrutiny Officer advised that the work programme would be considered at the next meeting, where Members would be invited to agree the work programme for the coming year and as part of that process, they would incorporate the request for feedback from home to school transport consultation as part of that process.

Resolved: That the report be noted.