Section 251 Statements
Under section 251 of the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009 all Local Authorities must complete and publish their section 251 returns for both budget and outturn, these are in connection with their education functions and their children’s and young people’s functions. All local authorities in England prepare and submit a statements containing financial information about how much the local authority has budgeted / spent on their:
- schools budget
- de-delegated items
- high needs budget
- central provision within the schools budget
- children’s and young people’s services
This is so that meaningful comparisons of budget / expenditure may be made between all local authorities.
All budget and outturn statements must be prepared in a common format. Local authorities must upload their budget and outturn statements for the period to the DFE via the department’s COLLECT (Centralised On-Line for Learning, Education, Children and Teachers) system. They must also publish these on their websites.
S251 Budget
2023
2022
2021
Local Authorities were not required to produce the S251 budget for 2020-21 due to temporary rules related to the Covid-19 pandemic.
S251 Outturn
2022
- Table A – local authority level and high needs information [Excel]
- (ii) Table A1 – children’s and young people’s services [Excel]
