Rise in children enrolled in Glasgow schools leads to £3m overspend

A report was presented to the city administration committee on Thursday morning, confirming that the overspend was a result of the number of staff needed to deal with the higher number of pupils enrolled in schools across the city.

More money has also been spent on pupil transport, as well as clothing and footwear grants. The report also confirmed that these pressures had been offset by an underspend in early years employee costs and lower than anticipated school meal charges in both primary and secondary schools.

During the meeting, questions were raised about the overspend and whether the amount of refugees entering Glasgow could be contributing to the number of pupils enrolling in schools. 

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Councillor Philip Braat said: “Looking at the report it refers to the education overspend of £3m and it talks about a pupil roll increase.

“Is this down to an increase in children from Ukrainian refugee families and if so is there any additional money coming forward from the Scottish Government to cover that nationality?”

It was confirmed that funding from the UK Government would be issued to the council to help support these families and their children’s education and that the increase was likely to be as a result of the new homes being developed throughout Glasgow.

Depute council leader Richard Bell said: “We are anticipating and have very strong indications from the UK Government that they will be funding that. 

“It is just a general increase in terms of the pupil rolls that are increasing beyond what our expectation was. 

“Some of that will be around development and new houses in the city and part of the reason why the council tax is showing a bit of an increase in terms of its collection is because there is a bit more buoyancy in the council tax market than what was anticipated.”