SHOULD money be spent on bolstering teams of experts to help schools out of the red?

The question was discussed at a meeting of the Learning and Skills Scrutiny Committee on Friday, May 24.

Powys County Council’s (PCC) school’s dire financial position was under discussion.

On March 31, there were 21 schools with a cumulative deficit balances totalling £3.98 million.

In recent months, £2 million has been taken out of department.

And in a re-jig of senior staff, the post of education director has been deleted with the department being amalgamated with Social Services to form the “Children and Adults directorate.”

Lay committee member Graeme Robson, a Governor at Sennybridge Primary School, asked: “Schools have to take action if this situation is to change.

“Do you feel confident that you have the teams in the county council that can offer corporate support to schools when they need to take action?”

Head of finance, Jane Thomas, replied: “Yes we do.

“We meet with every school and have surgery sessions, planning ahead for budgets.

“We have been very effective with our support for school in recent years by having, HR (human resources) finance and challenge advisers all at meetings with the schools.

“So you have a team around the school looking at the options they have on curriculum delivery, finance and the hr process they have. It’s about the schools taking action.”

Mr Robson replied: “My concern is that you guys in corporate are under resourced.”

Ms Thomas, answered: “We all know the authority is under considerable financial pressure. In terms of policy in setting budgets, front line services are the priority.”

She said that she could not even guarantee that her own department would not suffer more cuts.

Ms Thomas added that schools paid for support from council departments and if that stayed in place the support would be there.

Mr Robson asked again: “Are we better off throwing in some tens of thousands of pounds at the centralised team with the potential of saving hundreds of thousands of pounds by giving schools dedicated corporate officers?”

Mr Robson believed this would be more helpful rather than school governors describing himself as “jobbing amateurs not experts,” in financial issues

Education portfolio holder, Myfanwy Alexander believed that school governors needed to share information.

Cllr Alexander said: “There may be another school in Powys that’s faced a similar position to yours. And they have got around these issues but we don’t know.

“Sometimes as governors we’re inventing the wheel every time. When 20 miles up the road that wheel is turning and we need to find out about it

Vice chair, Angela Davies, who chaired the discussion, added: “There is good amongst this awful red writing. How they do it needs to be shared.”