Councils divert two-year-old childcare money to fund SEN

Data gathered using the Freedom of Information Act revealed that some local authorities expect to retain money that is supposed to be for disadvantaged two-year-olds to fund SEN support for older children.

Last week, CYP Now revealed that almost half of local authorities planned to spend money earmarked for childcare providers on other activities.

Many said these activities would be related to the two-year-olds programme, such as staffing, training, administration, publicity and developing IT systems.

But more than a fifth of the councils that planned to withhold some of the allocation, which is  not ringfenced, cited SEN provision as a specific use of that money.

Bracknell Council said it would retain £22,341 from its allocation to fund SEN and additional educational needs support. Similarly, Wigan Council said it would put £24,560 aside for SEN support.

Barking and Dagenham Council said it would keep back £10,000 for “high needs one-to-one support”.

Windsor and Maidenhead Council said it planned to withhold about £187,000, because it expected take-up of the funded places to be lower than provided for by the funding allocation.

In its response, it explained that the council “proposed to redistribute the difference across other various schools budget lines, including special educational high-needs provision”.

CYP Now's findings were based on figures provided by 83 councils. Among these, 40 planned to withhold some money (48.2 per cent), of which nine cited SEN as a destination for the money (22.5 per cent).

Lorraine Peterson, chief executive of SEN charity Nasen, said she was unsurprised by the findings, since local authorities were “trying desperately to find any additional funding they can for SEN”.

“There is going to be a huge shortfall in funding for SEN”, she said. “I’m sure they’re trying to top it up with bits of other funds, such as the pupil premium.”

Some of the councils that cited SEN provision as a destination for the funding specified it would still be used for younger children.

The Department for Education wrote to all councils when it announced the allocations in November, indicating that the money could be used "to provide additional support for two-year-olds with additional educational needs and SEN”.

Portsmouth Council said a portion of the £546,611 it planned to retain would be spent on “additional support for two-year-olds with SEN”.

But the Isle of Wight Council said it would use £200,000 of its budget to “top up funding for high-needs under-fives”.

Peterson said the amount councils were directing towards two-year-olds' SEN needs was too little.

“Local authorities haven’t got the provision to meet the needs of disadvantaged two-year-olds,” she said.

“We’re already overloaded in the early years sector and these are going to be some of our most vulnerable children who need far more than what your average nursery can provide.

“Some local authorities may be thinking, we cannot provide what this is asking us to provide, so we will put that funding into schools so that we can meet their SEN needs through early intervention programmes, once they are in school full time.”

In total, the DfE has invested £625m in 2013/14 for councils to fund and create enough childcare places for the 20 per cent most disadvantaged two-year-olds from September.

A total of 129 local authorities responded to the Freedom of Information request in January, although 46 had yet to decide how to spend the money.