THE Government is to pay off up to 90 per cent of Somerset Council’s special educational and disabilities needs (SEND) deficit to help ease the risk of the authority going bankrupt.

The move came as the Government blocked an 11 per cent council tax rise which Somerset wanted to impose this year as it struggles to balance its budget.

Non-academy Somerset schools are funded through an annual grant (DSG) from the Department for Education (DfE).

DSG covers the budgets for individual mainstream primary and secondary schools, along with early years provision such as nursery places, and SEND children.

However, SEND demand has outstripped DSG funding for years, with Somerset’s deficit predicted to reach £116 million by the end of March.

Now, the DfE has said it will pay off most of the deficit, provided the council put in place by early summer a plan to control future spending.

The deficit has so far been kept off the council’s balance sheet by a ‘statutory override’ introduced by the Government in 2020 to help avoid the issuing of a Section 114 notice, which is the local government form of insolvency.

The override is due to end in March, 2028, with any DSG debt incurred after that time being absorbed by the DfE.

Under the DfE’s new proposals about £104.4 million of Somerset’s debt will be cleared, with the remaining £11.6 million staying off the books until the override ends in 2028, after which it will appear in the council’s accounts with potential to tip it into insolvency.

Somerset interim chief financial officer Clive Heaphy said the DfE would be monitoring the council’s progress, so it needed to demonstrate it ‘had a handle’ on SEND cases and was managing them in the best possible way.