Determination of an amount in respect of a budget deficit in previous financial years
25.—(1) Subject to paragraph (4), this regulation applies in the case of a school which becomes a grant-maintained school between 1st April 1995 and 1st April 1997 inclusive.
(2) In any case to which this regulation applies the amounts to be added together for the purpose of determining the amount of maintenance grant payable in respect of the school under regulation 5(1)(b) shall have deducted from them such amount, if any, determined in accordance with paragraph (3).
(3) The funding authority, having consulted the local education authority and the governing body of the school, shall determine such amount, if any, as appears to them to be fair and reasonable, in respect of any deficit incurred by the school in respect of its budget share in any previous financial year, having regard, in particular, to the following matters—
(a)the existence and the terms of any agreement in writing between the then governing body of the school and the maintaining local education authority regarding the repayment of such deficit;
(b)the existence in the maintaining local education authority’s scheme of provision permitting schools to anticipate their budget shares for the following year in order to finance planned items of expenditure;
(c)evidence that the maintaining local education authority took steps to reduce schools' budget shares where deficits have occurred and did not allow schools to carry over deficits from one year to the other with no planned reduction;
(d)the practice of the local education authority, in respect of schools which they maintain, regarding the writing off of deficits incurred by such schools in respect of their budget shares in previous financial years; and
(e)the amount, if any, previously determined in respect of the school by the funding authority in accordance with regulation 15(3), 16(3) or 30(10) of the 1995 Regulations and regulation 25(3), 26(3) or 42(6) of the 1996 Regulations.
(4) This regulation shall not apply in the case of a school if the funding authority, in accordance with regulation 15(3) of the 1995 Regulations or regulation 25(3) of the 1996 Regulations, determined no amount in respect of that school.