Financial year 2023-24

Planned LA and school expenditure

Data guidance

Published

Description

This document describes the underlying data files included in the Planned LA and School Expenditure in England. This data is released under the terms of the Open Government License and is intended to meet at least 3 stars for Open Data.

The methodology document should be referenced alongside this data. It provides information on the data sources, their coverage and quality as well as explaining methodology used in producing the data.

Coverage

The Statistical Publication: ‘Planned LA and school expenditure’ provides the latest information at national, regional and local level on the planned expenditure on schools, education and children's and young people's services by local authorities. The publication summarises the information that was collected via S251 Budget returns.

This publication includes information on:

  • Local authority planned spending on schools and other education. This includes a time-series giving the detailed breakdown of spending split by school-phase and overall spending area (e.g. individual schools budget, expenditure on free school meals, SEN support etc).
  • Local authority planned spending on children's and young people's services. This includes a time-series giving the detailed breakdown of spending category including  sure start centres, children looked after, family services and  youth justice.
  • Local authority planned spend on early years education. This includes the planned spend on early years education for 2, 3 and 4 years olds, by category of spend plus the number of hours of early year education . 
  • High needs places. This includes the number of high needs places to be provided. It includes places in mainstream schools with resourced provision or SEN units, special schools, pupil referral units and hospital schools.  The total planned expenditure on these places is also included. 

File formats and conventions

The data files are provided in comma-separated values format, which is compatible with standard spreadsheet software such as Excel.

The following symbols are used in the underlying data files as follows:

  • : Not available - this information has not been collected or there are no estimates available at this level of aggregation.
  • z = not applicable. The 'z' symbol is only to be used when an observation is not applicable (e.g. in tables of employment where people under 16 cannot legally be employed)
  • low = where a figure round to zero but is not zero. In the summary tables the figures presented are rounded to £million, “low” in these tables represents a figure of £4,999 or less. 

Data files

All data files associated with this releases are listed below with guidance on their content. To download any of these files, please visit our data catalogue.

Schools, other education and community - unrounded data

Filename
plannedexpenditure_schools_other_education_la_unrounded_data.csv
Geographic levels
Local authority; National; Regional
Time period
2015-16 to 2023-24
Content

This file contains the figures for planned expenditure on schools, other education and community categories for individual local authorities plus regional and national totals . Data is unrounded. 

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
category_of_planned_expenditureCategory of expenditure - Filter by expenditure category
early_years_establishmentsEarly years establishments
gross_planned_expenditureTotal gross planned expenditure
incomePlanned income
net_per_capita_planned_expenditurePer capita net planned expenditure
net_planned_expenditureTotal net planned expenditure
post_16Post 16 establishments
primary_schoolsPrimary schools
pupil_referral_units_and_alt_provisionPupil referral units and alternative provision
secondary_schoolsSecondary schools
sen_and_special_schoolsSEN and Special schools
Footnotes
  1. To reduce burdens on local authorities during the COVID-19 pandemic, data for 2020-21 was not collected.

Schools, other education and community - national rounded summary

Filename
plannedexpenditure_schools_other_education_nationalroundeddata.csv
Geographic levels
National
Time period
2015-16 to 2023-24
Content

This file contains the national figures for planned expenditure on schools and other education. Data is rounded to the nearest million. 

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
category_of_planned_expenditureCategory of expenditure - Filter by expenditure category
early_years_establishmentsEarly years establishments (£ million)
gross_planned_expenditureTotal gross planned expenditure (£ million)
incomePlanned income (£ million)
net_per_capita_planned_expenditurePer capita net planned expenditure
net_planned_expenditureTotal net planned expenditure (£ million)
post_16Post 16 establishments (£ million)
primary_schoolsPrimary schools (£ million)
pupil_referral_units_and_alt_provisionPupil referral units and alternative provision (£ million)
secondary_schoolsSecondary schools (£ million)
sen_and_special_schoolsSEN and Special schools (£ million)
Footnotes
  1. Data is from rounded national tables. For local authority or regional data, see unrounded local authority tables in "Explore data and files".
  2. To reduce burdens on local authorities during the COVID-19 pandemic, data for 2020-21 was not collected.

Children's and young people's services - unrounded data

Filename
plannedexpenditure_childrens_services_la_unrounded_data.csv
Geographic levels
Local authority; National; Regional
Time period
2015-16 to 2023-24
Content

This file contains the figures for planned expenditure on children's and young people's services for individual local authorities plus regional and national totals. Data is unrounded.

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
category_of_planned_expenditureCategory of expenditure - Filter by expenditure category
early_years_establishmentsEarly years establishments
gross_expenditureTotal gross planned expenditure
incomePlanned income
net_expenditureTotal net planned expenditure
per_capita_net_spendPer capita net planned expenditure
post_16Post 16 establishments
primary_schoolsPrimary schools
pupil_referral_units_and_alt_provisionPupil referral units and alternative provision
secondary_schoolsSecondary schools
sen_and_special_schoolsSEN and Special schools
Footnotes
  1. To reduce burdens on local authorities during the COVID-19 pandemic, data for 2020-21 was not collected.

Children's and young people's services - national rounded summary

Filename
plannedexpenditure_childrensservices_nationaldata.csv
Geographic levels
National
Time period
2015-16 to 2023-24
Content

This file contains the national totals for planned expenditure on children's and young peoples services . Data is rounded to the nearest million. 

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
category_of_planned_expenditureCategory of expenditure - Filter by expenditure category
gross_expenditureTotal gross planned expenditure (£ millions)
incomePlanned income (£ millions)
net_expenditureTotal net planned expenditure (£ millions)
per_capita_net_spendPer capita net planned expenditure (£)
Footnotes
  1. Data is from rounded national tables. For local authority or regional data, see unrounded local authority tables in "Explore data and files".
  2. To reduce burdens on local authorities during the COVID-19 pandemic, data for 2020-21 was not collected.

Early years - unrounded data

Filename
earlyyears_nationalregionalla.csv
Geographic levels
Local authority; National; Regional
Time period
2017-18 to 2023-24
Content

This file contains the figures for planned expenditure and places for early years for individual local authorities plus regional and national totals. Data is unrounded. 

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
AverageBaseRate_2YearOldsAverage base rate for entitlement hours for 2 year olds (spend per hour)
AverageBaseRate_EntitlementHours_3and4YearOldsAverage base rate for entitlement hours for 3 and 4 year olds (spend per hour)
AverageFundingRate_2YearOldsAverage funding rate for 2 year olds (spend per hour)
AverageFundingRate_3and4YearOldsAverage funding rate for 3 and 4 year olds (spend per hour)
BudgetExtraLocalHours_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - budget for extra local hours for 3 and 4 year olds
CentrallyRetainedBudget_2YearOldsOther spend on early education - centrally retained budget for 2 year olds
CentrallyRetainedBudget_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - centrally retained budget for 3 and 4 year olds
ContingencyBudget_2YearOldsOther spend on early education - contingency budget for 2 year olds
ContingencyBudget_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - contingency budget for 3 and 4 year olds
DisabilityAccessFund_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - disability access fund for 3 and 4 year olds
EarlyYearsPupilPremium_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - early years pupil premium for 3 and 4 year olds
NumberHours_2YearOldsNumber of hours funded for 2 year olds (millions)
NumberHours_3and4YearOldsNumber of hours funded for 3 and 4 year olds (millions)
SEN_inclusion_fund_EYBlock_2YearOldsSEN inclusion fund - from early years block funding for 2 year olds
SEN_inclusion_fund_EYBlock_3and4YearOldsSEN inclusion fund - from early years block funding for 3 and 4 year olds
SEN_inclusion_fund_HNBlock_2YearOldsSEN inclusion fund - from high needs block funding for 2 year olds
SEN_inclusion_fund_HNBlock_3and4YearOldsSEN inclusion fund - from high needs block funding for 3 and 4 year olds
SEN_inclusion_fund_Total_2YearOldsTotal SEN inclusion fund for 2 year olds
SEN_inclusion_fund_Total_3and4YearOldsTotal SEN inclusion fund for 3 and 4 year olds
total_eysffbudget_3and4YearOldsTotal planned spend via early years single funding formula (EYSFF) - 3 and 4 year olds
TotalEYSFFBudget_2YearOldsTotal planned spend via early years single funding formula (EYSFF) - 2 year olds
Footnotes
  1. To reduce burdens on local authorities during the COVID-19 pandemic, data for 2020-21 was not collected.

Early years - national rounded summary

Filename
earlyyears_nationalsummarytable.csv
Geographic levels
National
Time period
2017-18 to 2023-24
Content

 This file contains the headline totals for each main category of planned expenditure and places for early years. Data is rounded to the nearest million. 

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
AverageBaseRate_2YearOldsAverage base rate for entitlement hours for 2 year olds (spend per hour)
AverageBaseRate_EntitlementHours_3and4YearOldsAverage base rate for entitlement hours for 3 and 4 year olds (spend per hour)
AverageFundingRate_2YearOldsAverage funding rate for 2 year olds (spend per hour)
AverageFundingRate_3and4YearOldsAverage funding rate for 3 and 4 year olds (spend per hour)
BudgetExtraLocalHours_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - budget for extra local hours for 3 and 4 year olds (million)
CentrallyRetainedBudget_2YearOldsOther spend on early education - centrally retained budget for 2 year olds (million)
CentrallyRetainedBudget_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - centrally retained budget for 3 and 4 year olds (million)
ContingencyBudget_2YearOldsOther spend on early education - contingency budget for 2 year olds (million)
ContingencyBudget_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - contingency budget for 3 and 4 year olds (million)
DisabilityAccessFund_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - disability access fund for 3 and 4 year olds (million)
EarlyYearsPupilPremium_3and4YearOldsOther spend on early education - early years pupil premium for 3 and 4 year olds (million)
NumberHours_2YearOldsNumber of hours funded for 2 year olds (millions)
NumberHours_3and4YearOldsNumber of hours funded for 3 and 4 year olds (millions)
SEN_inclusion_fund_EYBlock_2YearOldsSEN inclusion fund - from early years block funding for 2 year olds (million)
SEN_inclusion_fund_EYBlock_3and4YearOldsSEN inclusion fund - from early years block funding for 3 and 4 year olds (million)
SEN_inclusion_fund_HNBlock_2YearOldsSEN inclusion fund - from high needs block funding for 2 year olds (million)
SEN_inclusion_fund_HNBlock_3and4YearOldsSEN inclusion fund - from high needs block funding for 3 and 4 year olds (million)
SEN_inclusion_fund_Total_2YearOldsTotal SEN inclusion fund for 2 year olds (million)
SEN_inclusion_fund_Total_3and4YearOldsTotal SEN inclusion fund for 3 and 4 year olds (million)
total_eysffbudget_3and4YearOldsTotal planned spend via early years single funding formula (EYSFF) - 3 and 4 year olds (million)
TotalEYSFFBudget_2YearOldsTotal planned spend via early years single funding formula (EYSFF) - 2 year olds (million)
Footnotes
  1. Data is from rounded national tables. For local authority or regional data, see unrounded local authority tables in "Explore data and files".
  2. To reduce burdens on local authorities during the COVID-19 pandemic, data for 2020-21 was not collected.

High needs places and funding - rounded data

Filename
highneedsplacesfunding_nationalregionalladatadecemberupdate2023.csv
Geographic levels
Local authority; National; Regional
Time period
2015-16 to 2023-24
Content

This file contains the national totals for high needs place funding. Data is rounded to the nearest million.

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
hospital_fundingTotal funding for hospital education places
number_hospital_places_apr22_aug22Number of hospital education places between April and August
number_hospital_places_sept22_mar23Number of hospital education places between September and March
number_pru_places_apr22_aug22Number of PRU places between April and August
number_pru_places_sept22_mar23Number of PRU places between September and March
number_sen_places_apr22_aug22Number of SEN places between April and August
number_sen_places_sept22_mar23Number of SEN places between September and March
pru_fundingTotal funding for PRU places
sen_fundingTotal funding for SEN places
Footnotes
  1. To reduce burdens on local authorities during the COVID-19 pandemic, data for 2020-21 was not collected.

High needs places and funding - school data

Filename
highneeds_schoolsdatadecemberupdate2023.csv
Geographic levels
School
Time period
2023-24
Content

The number of planned high needs places and the planned expenditure for individual schools. This includes SEN places (both mainstream and special), alternative provision and hospital education as reported by local authorities in England for the latest financial year. 

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
hospital_fundingTotal funding for hospital education places
number_hospital_places_apr23_aug23Number of hospital education places between April 2023 and August 2023
number_hospital_places_sept23_mar24Number of hospital education places between September 2023 and March 2024
number_pru_places_apr23_aug23Number of PRU places between April 2023 and August 2023
number_pru_places_sept23_mar24Number of PRU places between September 2023 and March 2024
number_sen_places_apr23_aug23Number of SEN places between April 2023 and August 2023
number_sen_places_sept23_mar24Number of SEN places between September 2023 and March 2024
pru_fundingTotal funding for PRU places
school_phaseSchool type
sen_fundingTotal funding for SEN places
total_fundingTotal funding for high needs

ANNEX - Headline facts and figures - 2023-24

Filename
plannedexpenditure_keystatistics.csv
Geographic levels
National
Time period
2023-24
Content

This file contains the headline totals rounded the nearest billion.

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
per_capita_cypsNet planned expenditure per capita on children's and young peoples services
per_capita_Other_edNet planned expenditure per capita on other education and community
per_capita_schoolsNet planned expenditure per capita on schools budgets
Total_planned_expenditure_cypsTotal net planned expenditure on children's and young peoples services
Total_planned_expenditure_other_educationTotal net planned expenditure on other education and community
Total_planned_expenditure_schoolsTotal net planned expenditure on schools
Footnotes
  1. Data is from rounded national tables. For local authority or regional data, see unrounded local authority tables in "Explore data and files".

ANNEX - National totals

Filename
totals_national.csv
Geographic levels
National
Time period
2015-16 to 2023-24
Content

This file contains the headline totals for each main category of planned expenditure. These are rounded to the nearest billion.

Variable names and descriptions

Variable names and descriptions for this file are provided below:

Variable nameVariable description
DescriptionMain area of expenditure - Filter by main area of expendture
gross_expenditurePlanned gross expenditure (£ billion)
incomePlanned income (£ billion)
net_expenditurePlanned net expenditure (£ billion)
Footnotes
  1. Data is from rounded national tables. For local authority or regional data, see unrounded local authority tables in "Explore data and files".
  2. To reduce burdens on local authorities during the COVID-19 pandemic, data for 2020-21 was not collected.