FEATURE: SMART PROCUREMENT
Stronger together? “
2-5 school MAT CFO W
ith new research published this month revealing how Multi- Academy Trusts (MATs) are pooling GAG and reserves, and highlighting the opportunities and challenges facing leaders around centralising their operations to look after “financially weaker schools” or “target additional resources”, in our final feature this month we take a look at the procurement landscape to get an idea of how MATs are evolving their approaches to needs-based budgeting.
In November and December last year MAT finance specialists CJK Associates and MAT finance software developers IMP Software partnered to conduct a survey among 155 trusts in England exploring how they are evolving their approaches to needs-based budgeting. “GAG Pooling and Centralisation in MATs: 2024 Update” is the result of that survey.
The survey was designed to uncover the latest insights around how MAT operations are being managed, current and desired future plans around centralising functions, pooling reserves and General Annual Grant (GAG), and financial models being utilised by trusts which are already GAG pooling. It also gathers perspectives on the reported and expected benefits of GAG pooling, the reasons for doing this, and advice on consultation, piloting and implementation.
According to responding MAT representatives, based at trusts of all sizes across the country, 50% are already pooling GAG and reserves. Within this, 20% are specifically pooling GAG centrally before allocating to school and other budget holders, and a further 38% say they would like to adopt GAG pooling in the future.
For those already GAG pooling, 94% reported that looking after financially weaker schools or targeting additional resource is the main benefit of their approach. For those intending to GAG pool in the future, driving operational efficiencies is cited by 97% as the primary expected benefit. The main reasons for not GAG pooling are the perceived impact on school autonomy and colleagues feeling funds should be allocated specifically to students in their own school.
The study also found that a needs-based model/ICFP is by far the most common approach to funding allocation to academy budgets, both now
32
www.education-today.co.uk March 2024
Pooling of GAG allows us to target investment into under-performing or financially weaker academies, accelerating improvements or supporting schools whilst pupil numbers increase, and financial efficiencies are made to return budgets to a stronger position. We are luckyin that all our schools fall within one local authority area and we are a small trust. Our reasons for pooling, and therefore communications to headteachers, were focused around school improvement and sharing of resources rather than evening out funding formulas. This made implementation easier and reduced the number of issues arising during policy development and consultation.”
and in the future. Significantly, around 80% rate their likelihood to recom- mending the approach they took to implementing GAG pooling as 8 out of 10 or higher. A further 47% of MATs already pool reserves centrally and a further 29% would like to pool their reserves in in future. IT, finance and HR are the most likely functions to have fully centralised line management arrangements, at approximately 55%-60% of trusts. Facilities and safeguarding are more likely to have a mix of central and local management, and safeguarding is also most likely to have local operation teams line-managed by school leadership. MATs showed the strongest intent to further centralise procurement and finance. Chris Kirk, Director of CJK Associates, said: “GAG Pooling and Centralisation in MATs: 2024 Update demonstrates that an increasingly large number of MATs are already pooling or actively considering it, building on similar upward trajectory highlighted by other sector reports. Our latest survey findings also imply that in future, up to 80% trusts will pool reserves and nearly 60% will implement GAG pooling. “The debate around GAG pooling, in particular, continues but practice is definitely evolving. Schools’ groups already pooling GAG focus on fostering equality between schools, providing consistent support, and efficiently
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44
