Additional Learning Needs (ALN) funding: In Brief

On Wednesday 4 November, Senedd Members will debate a petition calling on the Welsh Government to “allocate the full consequential funding” received from Westminster in respect of Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) expenditure in England, to Additional Learning Needs (ALN) in Wales. The petition has received over 11,000 signatures. This article provides some relevant background information.  

• Our research briefing for the Petitions Committee in September explains the origins and nature of the ‘consequential funding’, how the Welsh Government planned to use it and the ensuing debate, how ALN provision is currently funded and levels of expenditure.

• There have been some developments since, most notably the allocation in the Second Supplementary Budget 2026-27 of an additional £60 million towards ALN provision. This was agreed between the Plaid Cymru Welsh Government and Welsh Labour.

• ALN is a high-profile policy area within education, with major reforms having received considerable scrutiny and being a common subject of constituents’ concerns. 

• Audit Wales reported in April of a system “under strain” and the WLGA has highlighted ALN as a leading budget pressure for local authorities. The Cabinet Minister for Education has pointed to the need to develop a “sustainable ALN system” and the Welsh Government is in discussions with the WLGA and teaching unions about this and associated issues.

• The majority of ALN funding is contained within the delegated budgets local authorities give to schools, and which include a notional allocation for ALN provision. Annual data shows £764m was budgeted at the start of 2026-27 to be spent on ALN: an increase of £96m or 14% compared with the previous year, and an increase of 89% from £405m in 2019-20.

• The agreement reached over the Second Supplementary Budget 2026-27, which is due to be debated and voted on in the Senedd on Tuesday (the day before this debate on the ALN petition) may have gone some way towards addressing the issues raised by the petition.

• However, with no announcement yet regarding future budgets, it is unclear how the £60m allocation in 2026-27 compares to the £120m over three years, which the Welsh Government offered (and the Senedd rejected) in July, or the total £322 million consequential received. More is likely to be revealed when the 2027-28 draft budget is published later this month.

In Brief by Michael Dauncey, Senedd Research, Welsh Parliament