Explanatory note

These Regulations, which apply only to grant-maintained schools and grant-maintained special schools situated in Wales, replace with modifications the Education (Grant-Maintained and Grant-Maintained Special Schools) (Finance) (Wales) Regulations 1996 (as amended), which are revoked. Like the earlier Regulations, the present Regulations extend to newly established grant-maintained schools and to grant-maintained special schools, as well as to former county and voluntary schools which have acquired grant-maintained status. The main changes of substance are outlined below.

Part II of the Regulations provides for the determination and redetermination of the amount of maintenance grant to be paid to governing bodies of grant-maintained schools and grant-maintained special schools on a similar basis to that provided for under Part II of the 1996 Regulations (as amended), save that there is now provision for deducting from the amount determined under regulation 4 in respect of maintenance grant amounts representing, respectively, excessive unspent maintenance grant received in respect of earlier financial years (regulation 12) and excessive severance payments made on or after 1st January 1997 (regulation 13).

Parts III and IV are unchanged.

Schedules 1 to 4 are unchanged.

Schedule 5 (which sets out categories of expenditure in respect of which special purpose grants may be paid) includes a new category of special purpose grant to cover expenditure incurred under a contract for the provision of property and services to, or for the purposes of, a school, where the provision of the services is linked to and dependent upon the provision of the property (paragraph 2(c)(vii)).