Colleges, training providers, and schools handed back 15 per cent – £28 million – of cash earmarked for Covid catch-up tutoring in the first two years of the scheme for 16- to 19-year-olds, blaming rigid eligibility rules and stop-start policy.
FE Week analysis of new 16-19 tuition fund spend figures shows that of the total £187.5 million allocated to over 2,000 education providers across 2020/21 and 2021/22, £159.5 million was spent.
Almost 300 providers with an allocation failed to spend a penny over that period and returned all funding to the Department for Education.
The DfE said it was allowed to reinvest the clawed-back tutoring cash within the department to support other 16 to 19 and wider education funding pressures, rather than handing it back to the Treasury.
