Assurance sought over service restructure

Assurances have been given by education chiefs that a staffing review to find £400,000 in savings will not affect specialist help given to schools.

At a meeting of the Powys County Council’s Learning and Skills scrutiny committee on Wednesday, January 29 councillors and independent lay members went through next year’s budget proposal for schools and the education department.

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The education department is set to receive a funding increase of £18.643 million in the council’s 2025/2026 budget which is up from £17.854 million this year.

However, the department has to deliver £1.261 million of savings to help the council balance its books in the coming year with £400,000 to come from a staffing review.

In November, the Liberal Democrat/Labour administration agreed a new Additional Learning Needs (ALN) and Inclusion Strategic Plan for Powys youngsters,

Liberal Democrat, Cllr Angela Davies wondered whether this strategy would be weakened.

Cllr Davies said: “What is the impact of potential staffing cuts in delivering the ALN (Additional Learning Needs) strategy.”

Director of education, Richard Jones said: “It’s not just an excercise in cuts.

“There isn’t any reduction in staff in our ALN teams.”

He explained that the review was an attempt to produce a new staffing structure that would “align” with services priorities which includes ALN.

Cllr Davies asked whether delivering this staffing review as well as the ALN strategy was putting “undue pressure” to deliver two big pieces of work “at the same time.”

Dr Jones explained that the department had been working on the proposal since September and had “distributed the pressure” of the workload around its staff.

Dr Jones stressed: “We do need to change the structures to meet the current and emerging needs of our schools.”

Cabinet member for education, Cllr Pete Roberts said that as the council move through school “transformation” there will come a point that it will “come into” the education department itself and not just schools.

“This is one of those points,” said Cllr Roberts.

One of the issues with education and schools funding is that the financial year starts in April while the school year starts in September.

Powys Independents Gareth E Jones said: “I’m a bit nervous about this.

“I assume these changes will not be in place from April 1.”

He wondered if the savings were implemented from September whether another five months of savings equating to around £250,000, would be rolled over into 2026/2027?

Cllr Roberts said: “This is education central they are not tied to the academic year.”

Dr Jones said: “Any management of change process has to go through a consultation which is where we are at.

“We feel confident we can make this saving in the year we have indicated, and they would be made at different points through the financial year.”

Recommendations from the committee will be added to the budget papers that will go in front of councillors at a meeting on February 20 when they vote on the overall budget.