Free school travel: funding allocations
Funding for local authorities to spend on home-to-school travel for children from low-income families from 2021 to 2025.
Applies to England
Documents
Details
‘Allocations for extended rights to free travel and general duty to promote sustainable travel: 2021 to 2025’ shows how much funding local authorities have received from the Department for Education (DfE) for free school travel in each financial year from 2021 to 2025.
Local authorities use this funding to pay for home-to-school travel for children from low income families, as required by the Education Act 1996. Further information is available in the travel to school for children of compulsory school age (5-16) statutory guidance.
In the 2024 to 2025 financial year, funding will be paid by DfE to local authorities in 2 instalments (April and October) as a Section 31 grant.
‘Extended rights grant allocations financial year 2024 to 2025: explanatory note on methodology’ provides an overview of the funding methodology for the grant.
‘Additional school and college transport capacity funding allocations’ shows the funding that local transport authorities received to support additional dedicated school and college transport. It relates to the period when social distancing was required on public transport in response to coronavirus (COVID-19).
Contact
Local authorities who have questions about the funding can email school.travel@education.gov.uk.
Parents can read about home-to-school travel or contact their local authority.
Contact the DfE for any other enquiries about home-to-school travel.
Updates to this page
Last updated 29 February 2024 + show all updates
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Updated documents for the 2024 to 2025 financial year.
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'Allocations for extended rights to free travel and general duty to promote sustainable travel: 2020 to 2024' 'Extended rights grant allocations financial year 2023 to 2024: explanatory note on methodology' and 'Extended rights for home-to-school travel: grant determination letter for financial year 2023 to 2024' were added.
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Updated to include information on the grant allocations for 2022 to 2023.
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Updated to include information on the grant allocations for 2021 to 2022.
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'Additional school and college transport capacity funding allocations' document updated.
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'Additional school and college transport capacity funding allocations' document updated.
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'Additional school and college transport capacity funding allocations' document updated.
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Amended 'Additional school and college transport capacity funding allocations for the autumn term' to change the name 'Worcester City Council' to 'Worcestershire County Council'.
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'Additional school and college transport capacity funding allocations for the autumn term’ updated to reflect additional funding allocations for the second half of the autumn term.
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Added: Additional school and college transport capacity funding allocations up to October 2020 half term.
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Updated to include the grant allocations for 2020 to 2021.
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Updated with 2019 to 2020 funding allocations.
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Updated funding allocation spreadsheet.
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Updated allocations for extended rights to free travel and general duty to promote sustainable travel, to reflect 2015 to 2019. Updated grant determination letter for 2018 to 2019.
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Updated page with 2017 to 2018 allocations.
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Updated allocations document to include data for the 2016 to 2017 financial year; added grant determination letter.
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First published.