Closing £310k Without Breaking Statutory Duties

The framework, stated before the options

1. Statutory and legal duties - SEN provision, admissions, safeguarding, health and safety, financial reporting. Not discretionary, regardless of cost.
2. Core purpose - quality of teaching in the curriculum all pupils follow, and the behaviour and attendance systems that make teaching possible.
3. Everything else, ranked by impact per pound.

This order matters because 82% of spend is staffing: any credible saving is a staffing decision, and the temptation will be to cut the things that are easiest to cut rather than the things that are least necessary.

Protect

• SEN and nurture provision. Not sentiment - arithmetic and law. Removing provision for pupils with EHCPs does not remove the duty; it transfers cost to tribunals, alternative provision and exclusions, all of which are more expensive. The funding gap (60% coverage) is a negotiation with the local authority, not a saving to be taken from children.
• Core subject staffing and the lowest class-size commitments in Years 7–11, because intake falling by 45 does not fall evenly across the timetable.

Cut or restructure

• Leadership and TLR structure: consolidate posts, reduce the number of allowance holders, protect the classroom.
• Non-staff costs: energy contracts, reprographics, catering, supplier consolidation - real but small; do not pretend they close £310k.
• Sixth form small classes: model it properly first. Three subjects with 22 students between them are expensive per head, but closing them may breach 16–19 funding assumptions, strand students mid-course, and damage the sixth form's viability as a whole. Options are: combine classes, move to a two-year teach-out, partnership with a neighbouring provider, or raise the minimum class size for new intakes.
• IT: the failing server is a business-continuity risk, not a nice-to-have. A lease or cloud migration may cost less over three years than emergency fixes and lost finance data.

What I would refuse

“Letting the market decide” is not available to a maintained school with statutory duties. I would say so to the governor plainly and in writing.

The governor

Individual governors have no executive authority; they hold the school to account collectively. My response would be courteous, private and unambiguous:

• Closing nurture without review would likely breach the school's duty to secure the special educational provision in pupils' EHCPs and could amount to discrimination arising from disability. Any change must follow consultation, an equality impact assessment and, where an EHCP pupil is affected, the annual review process.
• “Letting the market decide” is not a lawful decision-making standard for a maintained school: the governing body must act on educational and financial grounds, with consultation, and cannot simply allow provision to collapse. I would put the same points in a short written note to the chair so the position is minuted, and I would welcome the governor's challenge on cost - the energy is useful, the direction is not.

The staff

Rumours of redundancy are already doing damage: the best teachers update their CVs before the consultation starts. I would:

• Communicate within days, before the plan is complete: what is true (a deficit, a required balanced budget, a review of staffing structures), what is not yet decided, the timetable, and the commitment to consultation and to no surprises.
• Involve unions early - a recognition agreement is a resource, not an obstacle.
• Keep a single source of truth: one weekly update, so corridor rumour has competition.

Governing body handling

I would take a menu with risk ratings: each option with saving, impact on pupils, legal exposure and reversibility, so the governing body makes a decision rather than receiving a fait accompli. That protects governors, protects me, and makes the minutes a defensible record.

Timeline

• Weeks 1–2: verify the forecast with the finance committee; separate structural deficit from one-off costs; confirm the LA's deadline and required format.
• Weeks 3–6: build the option menu with the business manager; model each option at three years, not one, because a saving that costs more in year three is not a saving.
• Weeks 6–8: consult the governing body, the unions and staff; equality impact assessment on every option affecting pupils with protected characteristics.
• Weeks 8–12: formal consultation on any restructure; redundancy selection against objective, published criteria; notice periods observed.
• Onwards: monthly monitoring and a termly report to governors; a trigger point agreed in advance for what happens if intake falls further.

Legal constraints that are not negotiable

• Statutory SEN duties - provision in EHCPs must be secured; funding shortfalls are pursued with the LA, not absorbed by withdrawing provision.
• Equality Act 2010 - no discrimination arising from disability, and reasonable adjustments continue throughout.
• Employment law - fair selection, consultation, appeal, and correct notice; redundancy is not a shortcut for performance concerns.
• Financial accountability - the governing body must set a balanced budget and the head must not commit expenditure beyond delegated limits; the LA must be informed if a deficit recovery plan is required.
• Health and safety and safeguarding - cannot be traded for savings; the IT failure is a data-protection and business-continuity risk under the same heading.

The judgement at the centre

A balanced budget is a means, not an achievement. If the plan balances the books by making the school worse for the pupils who most depend on it, it will cost more in the medium term and it will be the wrong answer even if the spreadsheet turns black.