13th Report - Improving educational outcomes for disadvantaged children

Select Committee
Public Accounts Committee HC 365 7 March 2025
Report Status Government responded
Conclusions & Recommendations 29 items (8 recs)
Source View on Parliament website
Government Response (AI assessment · 29 of 29 classified)
Accepted 20
Acknowledged 2
Deferred 4
Rejected 3
Government response
Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Thirteenth report from Session 2024-25 · published 16 May 2025
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Recommendations & Conclusions

4 results
10 Conclusion Deferred
Pupil Premium funding declined in real terms despite its stronger evidence base
Conclusion
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 Summary
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
National funding formula's disadvantage elements increased due to rising SEND complexity
Conclusion
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 Summary
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
Department prioritises funding towards disadvantage and early years, considering wider outcomes
Conclusion
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 Summary
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
Many schools fail to publish required Pupil Premium strategy statements, with limited departmental follow-up.
Recommendation
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 Summary
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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