Source · Select Committees · Education Committee
Recommendation 7
7
Processes to scrutinise how local authorities are spending their Pupil Premium Plus grant are insufficient.
Conclusion
Processes to scrutinise how local authorities are spending their Pupil Premium Plus grant are insufficient. There must be strengthened accountability with clear penalties for local authorities who are not properly spending the grant on raising the educational attainment of looked-after children. (Paragraph 30) Educational poverty: how children in residential care have been let down and what to do about it 45
Government Response
Acknowledged
HM Government
Acknowledged
The department’s statutory guidance Promoting the education of looked-after children and previously looked-after children,15 is clear about Pupil Premium Plus (PP+), stating that, “VSHs, working with education settings, should implement PP+ arrangements for all looked-after children,” and “All VSHs should publish a clear policy on their use of PP+, including how they decide the level and use of top-sliced funding.” Further detail is set out in Pupil premium: virtual school heads’ responsibilities16 guidance–which states that “VSHs are responsible for managing pupil premium funding for the children they look after” and further outlines that any funding retained centrally should not be used to fund services that the local authority is responsible for funding. The guidance documents require the publication of an annual report by VSHs and specify that this should include details of how the Pupil Premium funding has been managed by the VSH, and evidence of how the funding has been used to support the achievement of the children looked-after by their local authority. Ofsted’s framework for inspecting local authority children’s services (ILACS)17 includes judgement on the experiences and progress of children in care and care leavers. Inspection reports routinely offer assessment of the effectiveness of individual VSHs in their narrative on such judgement–with inspectors requesting the annual report of the VSH and the data used by the VSH and the local authority to monitor the attainment, progress, attendance, exclusion, employment and training of children in care and care leavers. As part of this inspection, a schools HMI carries out two days of fieldwork, and they will usually interview the virtual school headteacher. We will consider further changes to the guidance and specifically whether it should stipulate that the VSH must sign-off on all use of the funding and whether more detailed financial information should be included in the Virtual School Annual Report provided to Ofsted. In doing so we need to be mindful as to whether the addition of these processes could have any unintended consequences on VSHs’ capacity to effectively carry out their wider role. In addition, and also in the context of the upcoming implementation strategy, we are considering the care review recommendations for greater accountability for VSHs on the educational attainment of children in care and care leavers up to age 25 through Ofsted’s ILAC framework.