Improving educational outcomes for disadvantaged children

Public Accounts Committee Closed Inquiry
Opened: 31 Oct 2024 Closed: 16 May 2025 Parliament page
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 … Read more
8 Recommendations
21 Conclusions
1 Report
1 Oral session
1 Letter
1 Event
Activity timeline 5 events
16 May
2025
Report published
7 Mar
2025
Report published
4 Feb
2025
Correspondence
13 Jan
2025
Oral evidence
13 Jan
2025
Formal meeting (oral evidence session) · The Grimond Room, Portcullis House
Oral evidence sessions 1 session
13 Jan 2025
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Improving educational outcomes for disadvantaged children
Juliet Chua CB · Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office Susan Acland-Hood · The Department for Education Tony Foot · Department for Education
Title HC No. Published Items Response
13th Report - Improving educational outcomes for disadvantaged c… HC 365 7 Mar 2025 29 Responded
Recommendations & Conclusions
4 results
Clear
10 Conclusion Deferred
13th Report - Improving educationa…
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 … Read more
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 review.
HM Treasury
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11 Conclusion Deferred
13th Report - Improving educationa…
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 … Read more
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 review.
HM Treasury
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12 Conclusion Deferred
13th Report - Improving educationa…
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 … Read more
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 review.
HM Treasury
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21 Recommendation Deferred
13th Report - Improving educationa…
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 … Read more
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 schools from Academic Year 2025-26.
HM Treasury
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Government Response AI assessment · 29 of 8 classified
Accepted 20
Acknowledged 2
Deferred 4
Rejected 3
Total 8 recs + 21 conclusions
Correspondence 1 letter
4 Feb 2025 To committee Letter from the Permanent Secretary of the Department for Education relating to the oral evidence session held on 13 January 2025 for the inquiry into Improving educational outcomes for disadvantaged children, 27 January 2025
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