THE NUMBER of schools expected to set deficit budgets in Cardiff has increased again, with some having been in the red for consecutive years.
Cardiff Council’s children and young people scrutiny committee was told at a meeting on Tuesday, June 10, that the local authority currently expects 55 schools to apply to be in deficit by March 31, 2026.
In 2023-24, 38 schools in Cardiff set deficit budgets and in the following year that figure rose to 46.
Of the 55 expected to set deficit budgets by March 2026, 45 are primary schools, nine are secondary schools and one is a special needs school.
Increasing financial pressure is one of a number of growing issues schools have faced since the Covid-19 pandemic.
Cardiff Council’s cabinet member for education, Cllr Sarah Merry, said: “We are all aware of the challenges that are actually facing our schools at the moment.
“There are things that come out of Covid, but whether that is coincidence or… a direct consequence I think is something we are still finding our way [through].
“We know there are challenges around attendance, growing additional learning needs… and of course we have had families that have faced a long period of financial issues and that also plays out in our schools.
“All of those represent challenges that our school leaders face up to but… we actually have factors like falling numbers in primary schools playing out at the same time.”
According to Cardiff Council data, seven schools in the city have been in deficit for three consecutive years, 22 have been in deficit for two consecutive years and 15 have been in deficit for one year.
The local authority’s head of finance, Ian Allwood said the council is still in conversation with schools ahead of next year’s budget setting process and the figure for those expected to set deficits could change.
He went on to say there are a number of reasons schools are having to set deficits, including the increasing complexity of children’s needs, uncertainty in the level of funding that will be available and the pressure of delivering educational outcomes with less money.
Cardiff Council has a protocol for schools in deficit, which allows it to have oversight on how schools are managing against their financial targets.
It is also aimed at getting the council and schools to work together on developing a financial plan.
A Conservative member of the children and young people scrutiny committee, Cllr Calum Davies, said: “If you look at the number of schools in deficit over the last few years, they have obviously increased. I think they have nearly doubled in about two or three years.
“If that is happening and… [if] most of the schools that are in deficit have been in deficit for more than three years, is that protocol working?
Mr Allwood answered: “I wouldn’t say it’s not working, but in terms of the deficit protocol… [it] is when you have applied to be in deficit and have agreed to be in deficit.
“You have signed up to a way of working with the local authority in terms of reporting regimes, what you need to inform the local authority of.”
The council officer went on to add: “We are trusting the schools and the schools are trusting the local authorities and we are working together.
“If I go back to where the deficit protocol was six or seven years ago, it was a lot more strict… I wouldn’t say trust was necessarily there between the local authority and the schools.
“We have to do that because it is a challenges that schools are not necessarily going to get out of on their own.”
Some of the other cost pressures facing schools include teachers’ pay, the cost of managing school buildings and carrying out repairs, utility costs and the cost of supply teachers and agency staff.
Cardiff Council’s cabinet member for finance, modernisation and performance, Cllr Chris Weaver, said: “We recognise the challenges that schools face.
“I sit on two governing bodies and the school budget forum… and its something we discuss through the year as well as in budget setting.
“Schools, alongside children’s and adult services over the last many years… have made up the bulk of the area that has received the extra cash that this council has had to find for services.”
