The same, really. But just sometimes, the Government doesn't think about the staff in the pupil referral units, because we've gone back to the Government to tell them, 'Right, you've provided money to school staff, but what about staff that need training—perhaps more than staff in the school sector?' And in fairness, they have addressed that, but perhaps it's not at the forefront of their minds when they're thinking of providing funding to the schools. So, it's a little bit of an afterthought. But this will be needed in the future, certainly.
And maybe I can ask the WLGA: are the difficulties that can arise between the money that is kept back by local authorities and the funding that goes directly to schools—can that therefore affect the kind of provision that's happening from authority to authority?
Yes, sure. The delegation levels are already very high in most authority areas, and we've got agreements in place with the Government to make sure that more money, or as much money as possible, is devolved to schools. So, I don't think that's a direct factor. I think the factors that really affect exclusions, which is where I think the question came from: you've got the very narrow measure at the end of key stage 4 attainment, which I think has put pressure on some schools, certainly, and headteachers have felt that—sometimes excluded, or otherwise put into another school as a consequence, which is regrettable, but that's what's happened. And on the additional learning needs side, whilst the Minister has currently made some more money available, if we look at experiences that have happened in England, in particular, because there are direct parallels there with legislation, we know from those experiences that ALN funding has become increasingly under pressure—there have been big issues around tribunals, to the point where local authorities at one point almost gave up going to tribunals, because they were losing them time and time again. So, there are financial pressures there, but I don't think the levels of delegation have any impact on that.
Okay. But just the pressures coming in with the new Act et cetera could mean more expulsions.