# Education Act 1996, Section 458: Charges for board and lodging at boarding schools.

Extent: E+W

(1) Subject to subsections (2) to (5) and section 49 of the Additional Learning Needs and Education Tribunal (Wales) Act 2018, where a registered pupil at a maintained school is provided at the school with board and lodging, there shall be payable in respect of the board and lodging by the parent of the pupil concerned, to the local authority, charges not exceeding the cost to the authority . . . of providing the board and lodging.
(2) Where—
(a) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
(b) the local authority for that pupil’s area are of the opinion that education suitable to his age, ability and aptitude and to any special educational needs he may have cannot otherwise be provided for him,
then, where the school is maintained by the local authority for his area, that authority shall remit the whole of the charges payable under this section and, in any other case, that authority shall pay the whole of the charges payable under this section to the authority which maintain the school.
(3) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
(4) Where the local authority for the pupil’s area are satisfied that payment of the full charges payable under this section would involve financial hardship to the parent of the pupil concerned, the authority—
(a) in the case of charges payable to the authority, shall remit so much of those charges as falls in accordance with subsection (5) to be so remitted, and
(b) in the case of charges payable to another local authority . . . in respect of board and lodging, shall pay so much of those charges as falls in accordance with subsection (5) to be so paid.
(5) The amount that falls to be remitted or paid by a local authority by virtue of subsection (4)(a) or (b) is—
(a) such part of the charges in question as the authority consider ought not to be paid by the pupil’s parent in order to avoid such hardship as is mentioned in subsection (4), or
(b) the whole of those charges if, in their opinion, such hardship cannot otherwise be avoided.
(6) In its application to a local authority in Wales, references in this section to special educational needs are to be interpreted as references to additional learning needs.

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Source: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1996/56/section/458 (the official version)
Page: https://openlegislation.uk/education-act-1996/section-458
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives.