Wrexham Council seeks £12m ALN money; Rowlands backs plea 2026

Key Points

• Sam Rowlands MS for Fflint Wrecsam has publicly supported the request of Wrexham Council that the Welsh Government make available about £12 million in ALN funding.
• The council says that the funding is part of £340 million UK Government “consequential” funding allocated to back ALN/SEN provision, but that only £120 million has been allocated over three years by the ministers.
• The Wrexham Council has written to the Finance Minister Elin Jones requesting a second thought on the issue, saying there is increasing deficit and school balance problem along with increased ALN expenditure.
• Sam Rowlands, the finance and education spokesperson of Welsh Conservatives, says that many schools have deficit budget where ALN accounts “a significant portion” and that without the funding the region will face heavy cuts in ALN funding and job losses.
• Anna Brychan MS is the Welsh Government’s Education Cabinet Member and acknowledges “significant pressures” on ALN funding while saying that a £120 million three-year ALN package has been identified, but that it cannot be proceeded with due to rejection of the first supplementary budget in the Senedd.

Wrexham (Wales Times) September 13, 2026 – Sam Rowlands MS has thrown his weight behind uk/local/wrexham/">Wrexham Council’s demand that the Welsh Government release millions in additional learning needs funding, as local authorities warn that school budget deficits and ALN cost pressures are reaching a breaking point.

What is the latest development on ALN funding in Wrexham?

The latest development centres on Wrexham County Borough Council’s formal appeal to the Welsh Government to reconsider how it allocates a £340 million “consequential” payment from the UK Government that was intended to support additional learning needs (ALN) and special educational needs (SEN) provision. As reported by Alec Doyle of Nation.Cymru, the council has written to Finance Minister Elin Jones asking ministers to release the money to help rebalance school budgets as pupils return to class. According to a statement published on Sam Rowlands’ own website, the MS for Fflint Wrecsam and Welsh Conservative spokesperson for finance, education and families said he was “fully behind Wrexham Council’s call for this to be reconsidered”.

Rowlands said he had raised the issue directly in the Senedd chamber with the Welsh Government to express concern and urge a rethink. He told the Herald Wales that he was “very disappointed and concerned at the Welsh Government’s stance on this matter when the supplementary budget was discussed in the Senedd in June”.

“The £340 million of consequential funding from the UK Government, which is specifically for children with additional special needs, should be used to support these children,”

he said.

What does Wrexham Council say about its ALN funding request?

Wrexham Council’s letter to Elin Jones sets out in detail why it believes the ALN consequential funding is urgently needed. Cllr Tina Mannering, chair of the council’s Customers, Performance, Resources and Governance Scrutiny Committee, wrote that increasing demands and complexities of ALN provision are placing “significant budget pressures” on the Education and Early Intervention Department, school transport, schools and Children’s Social Care. She said this is a continuing trend that has “contributed significantly to weakening the financial resilience of both the council and schools”.

Unlike in England, where SEN deficits have been allowed to accumulate off balance sheet before being written off by Westminster, all of the cost of increased ALN demand and provision in Wales has had to be fully funded from council and school budgets over several years, Mannering argued. “This means there is limited financial capacity to invest in solutions to try to address the continuing financial pressures in the ALN and school system,” she wrote. The council highlighted that, for the first time, there is a deficit balance on school budgets in Wrexham, and that school balances across Wales have reduced by £290 million in five years, a drop of 96%. Budgeted ALN expenditure in Wales is expected to rise by 14.4% in the current financial year, levels the council describes as “just not sustainable”.

Mannering warned that schools are finding it increasingly difficult to resource the necessary strategies and interventions for pupils with complex needs, putting significant pressure on teaching staff. “It is critical additional funding is made available now to stabilise the system, allow investment in additional capacity and to invest in interventions both within and outside of school settings to avoid the continuing growth of expensive external placements that in many cases provide poor outcomes for the children and their families,” she wrote. She asked Jones to raise the issue “at the highest level” to ensure the financial consequential is not a missed opportunity and that additional funding is provided this year to address system-wide demands.

What has Sam Rowlands MS said about the funding dispute?

Rowlands has been vocal about the dispute, linking it to earlier criticism of Plaid Cymru’s handling of the £340 million ALN consequential. On his website, he said: “Councils need these funds to support our young people and I am fully behind Wrexham Council’s call for this to be reconsidered.” He added: “Many schools in Wales are running deficit budgets. ALN is a significant proportion of that and this needs urgently addressing.”

Focusing on Wrexham, Rowlands said: “In Wrexham, for example, we have heard that the Council there needs its anticipated £12 million share of the ALN funds to avoid severe local budget cuts and job losses and they are not the only local authority in this predicament.” He described it as a “travesty to see money given to the Welsh Government to support our vulnerable children not being spent supporting ALN pupils in Wales”. Earlier this year, according to his statement, he had criticised Plaid Cymru for not allocating the £340 million given by the UK Government to be spent on ALN provision, and he has now raised the matter again in the Senedd.

How has the Welsh Government responded to the ALN funding calls?

The Welsh Government has acknowledged the pressure but stopped short of committing to release the full consequential immediately. As reported by Nation.Cymru, Anna Brychan MS, Cabinet Member for Education and the Welsh Language, replied that an announcement would be made in the autumn. “I recognise the significant pressures facing schools, local authorities, families and the wider education workforce in supporting learners with ALN,” she wrote. She said these pressures are being felt at a time when needs are becoming more complex and public services continue to operate within “extremely challenging financial constraints”.

Brychan explained that, as part of negotiations on its first supplementary budget, the Welsh Government had identified a £120 million, three-year funding package to support ALN capacity.

“This was intended to provide funding directly to schools, while also enabling local authorities and schools to work together to build a more sustainable system for the future,”

she said. However, following the Senedd’s vote against the first supplementary budget in July, that funding package could not move forward as intended. She added:

“The Welsh Government remains committed to strengthening the sustainability, clarity, capacity and confidence of the ALN system, so that children and young people receive the right support, at the right time, to meet their needs.”

What is the wider context of ALN funding pressures in Wales?

The dispute sits within a wider pattern of ALN-related financial strain across Wales. Official Welsh Government guidance on school funding states that the social deprivation factor in local authority formulas must not include any funding allocated for the support of pupils with additional learning needs, underscoring that ALN is meant to be recognised separately in funding calculations. Schools census results for January 2026 define a child or young person as having ALN if they have a learning difficulty or disability and need support that is additional to, or different from, the support generally available to others of the same age.

Nation.Cymru reported that the Welsh Local Government Association has argued that school spending on ALN has already eclipsed the £340 million consequential payment and that schools now “desperately need that money”. Wrexham MP Andrew Ranger has also weighed in, saying ALN debt exists in schools across the county borough but is “hidden” because it is not recorded as ALN debt, as the debate over the destination of large consequentials in Wales continues. He told Wrexham.com: “Formally, we don’t have the ALN debt that was built up in English councils, but we do… It is there, and therefore we are right to campaign to get this money that is desperately, desperately needed.” Ranger said his office receives regular ALN casework and that “parents and families and the children and the schools are really up against it”. Wrexham Council’s Lifelong Learning Scrutiny Committee previously voted to write urgently to Welsh ministers, copying all six Fflint Wrecsam members of the Senedd, demanding the consequential be passed to local authorities.

Background to the ALN funding dispute

The current row stems from how the £340 million UK Government consequential for SEN/ALN has been treated by the Welsh Government. In England, mainstream schools were permitted to accumulate overspends on special educational needs provision off their official balance sheets, with the UK Government agreeing to wipe those debts. To ensure Welsh schools were treated fairly, Westminster agreed to send a £340 million consequential payment to Cardiff this year.

However, in its failed supplementary budget, the Welsh Government proposed spending that money elsewhere, with just £120 million allocated to schools over three years. Wrexham Council says that before May’s Senedd election it had been promised around £12 million in ALN “consequentials” – money passed to Wales following additional UK Government spending on schools in England – which would eliminate much of the financial deficits facing schools in the borough. The council argues a significant proportion of those deficits have built up as a result of schools having to increase ALN provision.

Prediction: how this development could affect schools, families and local services

If the Welsh Government does not release additional ALN funding in the autumn, schools in Wrexham and other local authorities are likely to face deeper deficits, greater reliance on high-cost external placements and increased pressure on teaching staff, according to the council’s own assessment. Rowlands has warned that without the anticipated £12 million share, Wrexham could see severe local budget cuts and job losses, a scenario that would directly affect pupils with additional learning needs and their families.

For parents, continued underfunding could mean longer waits for support, reduced in-school provision and more children placed in expensive out-of-borough settings that, as Mannering noted, “in many cases provide poor outcomes for the children and their families”. For local services, the strain could spill over into Children’s Social Care and school transport budgets, further weakening the financial resilience of councils already managing reduced school balances. Conversely, if ministers do release more of the consequential this year, it could stabilise school budgets, allow investment in ALN capacity and reduce the growth of costly external placements, potentially improving outcomes for learners with additional needs across north-east Wales.