Paying for extended schools

Members who are starting to make plans for extended school activities are reminded that it is not lawful to spend money delegated for the purposes of children's education for extended activities.

This will be no problem as long as extended activities pay for themselves. However, some extension activities, adult education or child care for instance, are notoriously difficult to make accurate financial predictions for.

An operation can very easily run up a loss of £20,000 in six months, especially in the early days. Members will want to make sure there is a clear agreement with the LEA as to where responsibility for such a debt will lie and who will be responsible for running the operation.

By Ricahrd Bird, SHA Legal Consultant