To ask the Minister of Education to detail (i) what support exists for schools that are unable to afford to keep their classrooms at a temperature suitable for teaching children; and (ii) what direction has been given to schools for which this is the case.

(i) In the 2022-23 financial year, an additional £12.7m was allocated to schools to mitigate the impact of increased energy costs. In addition, from the 1 October 2022 to March 2023 schools benefitted from the Energy Bill Support Scheme, which protected them from excessively high energy bills over the winter period.

For the period 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024 schools will again benefit from a revised Energy Bill Discount Scheme, which provides a discount on gas and electricity unit prices subject to a capped discount. Schools do not need to do anything to obtain this discount, as it will be applied automatically to energy bills.

Since August 2020, the EA has proactively sought to mitigate the impact of increasing utility and energy costs by engaging an independent energy advisor to provide advice on purchasing energy, tariff changes and hedging purchase prices for electricity and gas on behalf of our schools.

In the most recent update from the EA, it has confirmed that following a review of 2023-24 energy costs by the energy advisor, energy costs are forecast to reduce significantly compared to the prior year.

(ii) Any school which is facing financial difficulty is encouraged to contact the EA, as funding authority for grant aided schools, in the first instance.