Children and Families – Financial Overview

Budget & Finance Overview & Scrutiny Committee

13th September 2011

1. CHILDREN AND FAMILIES (C&F): FUNDING SOURCES

Schools Budget -

ISB, £215.44m

Schools Budget – Central

Element, £21.10m

Achieve-ment &

Inclusion – General

Fund £10.40m

Social Care – General Fund, £47.43m

Total Gross C&F Budget - 2011/12 (£m)Total = £294.37m

2. SCHOOLS BUDGET - ISSUES

• Schools Budget has to be set each year in March based on estimated DSG as DSG is not confirmed until June/July

• 2011/12 DSG had a brought-forward deficit of £5.7m due to SEN pressures

• Major DfE consultation ongoing at the moment looking at radically changing Schools Funding:

• possibility of a national funding formula now dropped

• radical changes in funding methodology inevitably leads to winners and losers

• 2011/12 Settlement for Schools was “Cash-Flat” i.e. Schools in general received the same cash as 2010/11 - i.e. a real terms cut

3. SCHOOLS BUDGET - 2011/12

Schools Budget (£236.5m)

Individual Schools Budget (£215.4m)

School CSchool BSchool A

Central Element of Schools Budget (£21.1m):• SEN (£9.9m)• PRUs (£5.6m)• Early Years (£4.5m)• Admissions (£0.3m)• FSM, Licences etc (£0.5m)

• Teachers maternity, redundancy (£0.3m)

Dedicated Schools Grant (£238m)

Formula Distribution:Pupil Nos, Floor Area, SEN, Deprivation etc

4. 2011/12 BUDGET – (GENERAL FUND ONLY)

SEN ; £3,545,607

Services to Schools, £2,250,875

Education Welfare Service; £423,681

Alternative Education; £1,021,676

Youth & Connex-

ions; £3,155,023

Achievement and Inclusion£10.397m

5. 2011/12 BUDGET (GENERAL FUND ONLY)

Care Planning and CIN;

£10,674,860

Purchasing/ Placements, £23,327,130

Youth Offend-ing Team; £1,053,743

Children with Disabilities; £3,265,646

Early Years Incl Childrens Cen-tres; £9,114,317

Social Care£47.44m

6. BUDGET PRESSURES

2010/11 Overspends £k

Social Care Placements 1,466Social Care Legal Fees 736Children with Disabilities 300School Expansion costs 398

2,900

LESS: In-Year Savings -2,524

Outturn 376 (overspend)

7. 2011/12 SAVINGS

Children and Families Budget Reductions for 2011/12

£000 £0002011/12 Base Budget + Grants to be ceased 69,721

LESS: Departmental Savings 10,372 One council Savings etc 1,569 Loss of Grants 2,049 13,990 20.1%

55,731

ADD growth (Social Care+CWD) 2,100

Net Savings 11,8902011/12 Final Budget 57,831 17.1%

8. 2011/12 SAVINGSUnit Item £'000

Schools Traded Services and charging to the schools budget

Over the last three years C&F have reviewed charges to the schools budget rather than the general fund achieving £2.5m additional charges. Recent reviews have indicated that a further £1m can be charged mainly covering 3 children centres £860k. Further savings are still being reviewed for future years.

1,000

Children's Centres Restructuring of the children centre teams £550k and a review of centrally commissioned services £450k. A further £700k from Sure Start central expenditure and £255k from the development of a child based funding formula for ongoing allocations to centres. In addition a further £190k from not starting the Sudbury, Cricklewood and Kingsbury centre and £105k from various schools taking responsibility for all maintenance and revenue costs of buildings.

2,250

Social Care Transformation

A number of areas have been identified for reducing costs foster placements, children in residential homes, semi independent living, payments for children that have been adopted and other arrangements as well as families with recourse to public funds and the Youth Offending Service.

1,800

Children's Social Care Restructuring

Rationalisation of the fostering and adoption service including their panels. Income will be generated through the sale of approved adopters. A rationalisation of the safeguarding service t In addition there will be a reduction to commitments against the care matters grant with a cessation of the support to the Young Carers Centre, reductions in the Youth Offending Service and limited reductions in the Crisis Intervention Service and in unqualified staff in the localities social work teams.

1,300

Children with Disabilities and SEN

Restructuring of short break provision (£190k), cease Easter holiday play schemes (£20k), implementation of new continuing care framework awarding additional financial responsibility on health services(£50k), reduction in SEN early years support (£63k). Decrease in core staffing for the Education Psychology Service and increased charging of non statutory services (£108k).

431

School Improvement Service

Increase in charges for the Music Service (£50k) and £483k from reduction of consultancy support and post deletions within the School Improvement Service.

533

Youth & Connexions Restructuring and reduced service offering for the Youth Service including staff loses of £153k). For Connexions staff savings of £34k with £80k reduction to PA delivery contracts and reduced careers guidance contract (£200k).

546

Various Ceasing a number of ABG funded activities that ceased or become un-ringfenced, e.g. extended schools, YOF, PAYP, Early Years Workforce, School Travel Advisers, Choice Advisers, Children’s Fund

2,512

  TOTAL 10,372

9. 2011/12 Forecast Outturn

2011/12 Forecast Overspend

£000

SEN 1,500

Schools Budget

General Fund2011/12 Forecast Overspend

£000

Social Care Legal Fees 130

Social care Placements 230

Total 360

10. SEN Pressures

10. SEN Pressures

Past actions aimed at reducing the number of statutory assessments and statements: • Individual Pupil Support Agreements (IPSA) - lower level needs, an alternative to

statementing, September 2010.• new mainstream banding descriptors + increase in the threshold for which new

statements/IPSA’s will be provided, April 2011.

Will reduce spend in the medium/long term but not in the short term.

Current Actions - SEN Project Phase 1 (April 2011 to July 2011) • Expand local specialist provision to meet immediate demand and reduce out-

Borough costs : +41 places - Village School/Queens Park Community, Granville nursery and Alperton Community School - October 2011-Sept 2012

• proposal to redesignate Vernon House Special School to accommodate children on the autistic spectrum

• Develop single SEN database, improve management information and data to inform future planning

 • Develop strategy on commissioning and monitoring of out-borough places –

data analysis completed and priorities identified for joint work with West London Alliance

11. Measures to Reduce SEN Spend

Planned Actions - SEN Project Phase 2 (August 2011 – August 2012) • Review and re-launch of SEN and Inclusion Strategy

• Undertake end to end review, develop and embed new ways of working) (August 2011 – August 2012)

 • Continue to develop in-Borough specialist provision

reducing reliance on out-Borough provision. • Put in place new commissioning processes in collaboration

with the West London Alliance. • Implement re-structure of SEN and Inclusion Services to

better align service to support the SEN Strategy.  

11. Measures to Reduce SEN Spend

12. CHILDREN’S SOCIAL CARE PRESSURES

• Over recent years pressure from increasing LAC numbers has been the main cause of overspends in Children and Families.

• This pressure has been widespread across most local authorities and through the Social Care Transformation Programme, Children and Families have maintained LAC numbers well below that of statistical neighbours

• Over last 2 years referrals have gone up by 25% and number of children with a child protection plan has increased by 50%

• Expenditure on expensive placements such as residential and IFAs has steadily been reducing as illustrated in the following graphs:

12. CHILDREN’S SOCIAL CARE PRESSURES

WORKSTREAMS

Residential Placements-to reduce unit costs of residential units through cost and volume and advance payments reductions

Semi-independent accommodation-To reduce costs by increasing Brent shared houses from 6 to 12 units.

Fostering-To reduce overall costs by increasing the number of in-house foster carers (45 more by 2014) and reducing the reliance on expensive independent providers

No recourse to public funds-To reduce the number of families with no recourse to funds that are supported by the department

Post looked after children resources-To reduce the money paid out in support to families who are caring for children who are no longer “looked after”

Crisis Intervention and Support team- To review the work of the team to ensure a renewed focus on preventing children becoming looked after.

13. Measures to Reduce Children’s Social Care Pressures

Currently insufficient capacity in Brent primary schools resulting in 388 pupils without a school place as at July 2011. Latest GLA projections: upward trend in the demand for primary places is expected to continue beyond 2014-15. Potentially creating a requirement for 4,224 reception places by 2020 leading to a shortage of 692 reception places (or 23 new forms of entry) over the entire period.

Creating significant Capital and Revenue Financial Pressure

Year Deficit No. of Reception Classes

Form of Entry based on Demand for Reception

Classes

Total No. of R-Y6 classes Required

2011-12 -2 2 14

2012-13 -12 12 84

2013-14 -14 14 98

2014-15 -15 15 105

Summary of Forecast Deficit of Primary School Places 2011-12 to 2014-15

14. School Places Pressures