Early Years Organisations suffer Cut Backs in Highland council budget

14th February 2019

The Highland council agrred to slash £258,000 from the budget for Early Years organisations for 2019/20

The current budget for Early Years' Grants is £458k per annum. This is primarily an area-based budget where partners are able to apply for funding for one-off grants.

Applications are made and area officers make a decision on whether the grant should be awarded. However, this grant funding was set up many years ago for one-off payments and was not intended for organisations to apply annually to sustain services. The grant is to assist services whilst seeking funding sources elsewhere therefore there should be no expectation that they will be funded year on year.

Many of the applications are not actually for early years' provision with many of the applications from organisations for older children and young adults.

The amount available will be reduced by £258k and the remaining monies of £200k redirected into Service Level Agreements (SLAs) where provision is necessary to meet key service objectives, enabling key functions to be supported on a sustainable basis.

The review will be undertaken by Area teams who will assess which services meet key service objectives and will assess the sustainability of the service before agreeing an SLA, and will be discussed with the Third Sector Interface before any final decisions about the allocation of remaining funding.

To see the full range of cuts and changes in the budget go to -https://www.highland.gov.uk/meetings/meeting/4084/highland_council