Select Committee · Public Accounts Committee

Improving educational outcomes for disadvantaged children

Status: Closed Opened: 31 Oct 2024 Closed: 16 May 2025 8 recommendations 21 conclusions 1 report

The attainment gap sees disadvantaged children, on average, perform less well than their peers, affecting their future life chances. Government has a strategic objective to narrow the gap. The Department for Education (DfE) defines 2.1 million, or 27%, of children in state-funded schools as disadvantaged, based on registered eligibility for free school meals, or if …

Clear

Reports

1 report
Title HC No. Published Items Response
13th Report - Improving educational outcomes for disadvanta… HC 365 7 Mar 2025 29 Responded

Recommendations & Conclusions

4 items
10 Conclusion 13th Report - Improving educational out… Deferred

Pupil Premium funding declined in real terms despite its stronger evidence base

The Department considers it has better evidence of pupil premium effectively supporting disadvantaged children, assessing this evidence as strong, compared to that available for the disadvantage and deprivation elements of the national funding formula.27 Despite this, there has been a 3% real–terms reduction in pupil premium funding over the period …

Government response. The department is reviewing the allocation of core funding for schools, looking at the operation of the schools national funding formula (NFF), including the operation of “additional needs” funding in the NFF, with decisions for 2026-27 onwards informed by this …
HM Treasury
11 Conclusion 13th Report - Improving educational out… Deferred

National funding formula's disadvantage elements increased due to rising SEND complexity

The Department committed to keeping the balance of funding across different interventions under review.32 It told us that pupil premium and the disadvantage elements of the national funding formula should be considered together–with pupil premium being specifically directed towards disadvantaged children, and the funding formula using disadvantage as a proxy …

Government response. The department is reviewing the allocation of core funding for schools, looking at the operation of the schools national funding formula (NFF), including the operation of “additional needs” funding in the NFF, with decisions for 2026-27 onwards informed by this …
HM Treasury
12 Conclusion 13th Report - Improving educational out… Deferred

Department prioritises funding towards disadvantage and early years, considering wider outcomes

The Department stressed that, without an unlimited budget, it would always need to make trade–offs in its funding decisions.35 It told us it is firstly aiming to increase the proportion of funding targeted towards disadvantage, as it believes this has a greater marginal impact on outcomes for disadvantaged children.36 Secondly, …

Government response. The department is reviewing the allocation of core funding for schools, looking at the operation of the schools national funding formula (NFF), including the operation of “additional needs” funding in the NFF, with decisions for 2026-27 onwards informed by this …
HM Treasury
21 Recommendation 13th Report - Improving educational out… Deferred

Many schools fail to publish required Pupil Premium strategy statements, with limited departmental follow-up.

In terms of accountability for pupil premium, the Department described schools needing to clearly report how they used funding so governors could use this to provide challenge.63 All schools must publish an up–to–date pupil premium strategy statement setting out their spending plans. The Department acknowledged that its data showed that …

Government response. The department is reviewing options to improve reporting arrangements for the pupil premium grant, including potential digital solutions by Academic Year 2027-28, and is exploring ways to automate the current data collection and analysis process to obtain better data from …
HM Treasury

Oral evidence sessions

1 session
Date Witnesses
13 Jan 2025 Juliet Chua CB · Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, Susan Acland-Hood · The Department for Education, Tony Foot · Department for Education View ↗

Correspondence

1 letter
DateDirectionTitle
4 Feb 2025 To cttee Letter from the Permanent Secretary of the Department for Education relating to…