TO CHIEF EDUCATION OFFICERS

OF LEAS IN ENGLAND WHICH ARE

ELIGIBLE FOR TARGETED TRANSITIONAL

GRANT IN 2004-05

Direct line: 020 7925 5938

SCHOOL FUNDING 2004-06: SUPPORT FOR SCHOOLS IN FINANCIAL DIFFICULTY

I wrote to you on 29 October setting out details of the government's proposals for school funding in 2004-05 and 2005-06, including a guidance note on support for schools in financial difficulty. That note promised further guidance on transitional support at the time of the Local Government Finance Settlement.

That further guidance is now enclosed: it reiterates, for convenience, the advice in the original guidance on use of LEA headroom and gives additional guidance on transitional support, including the conditions that will apply and the processes that LEAs will need to follow. At Annex A to the guidance is a final list of allocations of the targeted grant, together with the maximum amounts that might be brought forward by each authority under the advance of grant arrangements. The targeted grant allocations are unchanged from the indicative allocations issued on 29 October, when rounded to one decimal place.

We look forward to receiving a Transitional Support Plan from your authority by the end of December, as set out in the guidance attached. If in the meantime you have any queries, please contact either Stephen Bishop (on use of headroom) or Jacquie Spatcher (on transitional support) at the addresses set out at the end of the guidance.

Yours sincerely

STEPHEN CROWNE