Official Statistics

Government grants statistics 2019 to 2020

Updated 27 August 2021

1. Purpose of this report

This report accompanies the release of the Government grants register 2019 to 2020. This report provides context to this grants data, an overview of grant spending and guidance notes on how the data has been compiled.

This release is classified as Experimental Statistics, a subset of Official Statistics, as the data and methodologies used to produce the statistics are still in development.

The Government grants register 2019 to 2020 constitutes the most comprehensive data publication to date and we are continuing to build on this progress. The details of this work are outlined in the statistics development plan accompanying this publication.

Government grants register 2019 to 2020 data release covers:

  • General grants and formula grants (at both scheme and award level) across all government departments. Note HM Treasury is not included in this publication because they do not manage any formula or general grants.
  • Grants funded during the period 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2020.
  • Grants that are new for 2019 to 2020 and grants that were set up in previous years which have continued to be active in 2019 to 2020.
  • Exchequer-funded grants (this excludes grants funded by devolved governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland); this includes overseas aid provided by the UK government as grants, but excludes grants made by the EU or the UK government contribution to the EU.
  • Any central government departments or arm’s length bodies (ALBs) that manage exchequer funded grants.

This data does not include:

  • Grants-in-aid – these are funds allocated from one part of government to another part of government, for example, central government funding for the running costs of non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs).

There are a number of notes and caveats that will help inform the interpretation of this data. A summary of these, as well as departmental statements, can be found at the end of this report. Note that values presented in this report are rounded. Therefore totals may not equal the sum of their parts, and percentages may not add up to exactly 100%.

We would appreciate your feedback to help us improve future publications. This can be provided via this feedback form.

2. Introduction to government grants

Government grants are funds intended to be permanently transferred[footnote 1] from a government organisation, to a grant recipient[footnote 2], in order to fulfil a policy or public interest need. Unlike contracts/procurements (e.g. for the purchase of goods or services), grants are provided with the focus on the outcomes and impacts of the activities being funded. Usually grants are awarded to finance (or reimburse expenditure on) the recipients’ activities in order to further the implementation of government policy or public interest, where it is neither appropriate nor possible for the government organisation to carry out those activities itself.

Grant spending accounts for around 13% of total UK government expenditure.[footnote 3] Government grant funding plays an important role domestically, in areas such as education, research, civil society and innovation, and abroad through international aid projects.

Grants can be used for a number of purposes, including providing financial subsidy to deliver activities and outcomes, supporting government policy initiatives, and funding research, development and innovation. Examples of grant funding from 2019 to 2020 include awards to fund Transport for London (TfL), compensate local authorities for business rates relief and promote sustainable clean energy abroad.

Key Statistics

2.1 Allocation of government grants

There are two allocation methods by which grants are issued:

  • Formula grants: are those calculated by way of a formula. This funding is provided, in recognition of specific criteria, by central government to organisations such as local authorities, schools and the police. Funding is determined by factors relevant to the purpose, such as population or number of pupils who receive free school meals. These grants account for 70% (£82.3 billion across 183 schemes) of government grant spending.

  • General grants: allow the government to secure policy objectives which the market cannot, such as innovation and research, and they allow an effective funding route for the voluntary and charitable sectors, for example to address homelessness and regional inequalities. General grants account for 30% (£35.3 billion across 1,732 schemes) of government grant spending.

Figure 1: Proportion of grant spending by scheme allocation type.

Source: Accompanying statistical tables – Table 1

2.2 Total grant spend by department and allocation method

The government spent £118 billion on grants in 2019 to 2020. This is a 4% increase from £113 billion in 2018 to 2019. The Department for Education (DfE) gave out the greatest amount of money as grants, accounting for £65.1 billion (55%) of the total value of government grants. This includes the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG), the General Annual Grant (GAG) and the 16-19 Education Grant, these three schemes account for a combined total of £50.4 billion. Large grant giving departments also include the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG), the Home Office (HO), the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and the Department for International Development (DfID) - which together with DfE gave out £110.7 billion (94%) of the total value of government grants.

Figure 2: Total grant spending by department and allocation method.

Source: Accompanying statistical tables – Table 1

3. Formula grants

Formula grants are those calculated by way of a formula. This funding is provided, in recognition of specific criteria, by central government to organisations such as local authorities, schools and the police. Funding is determined by factors relevant to the purpose, such as population or number of pupils who receive free school meals. These grants account for 70% (£82.3 billion across 183 schemes) of government grant spending. This is a 3% increase on the value in 2018 to 2019, when £79.8 billion was funded via formula schemes.

Figure 3: Formula grant spend by department.

Source: Accompanying statistical tables – Table 1

The largest grant funder is the DfE who provided £60.7 billion in formula grant funding during 2019 to 2020. Outside of the DfE, the next largest formula grant schemes are the HO’s £4.1 billion Police Main Grant 2019-20 and the HO’s £2.8 billion DCLG Funding 2019-20. See the government grants register, accompanying this bulletin, for details of all grant schemes.

3.1 Table 1: The 10 largest formula grants schemes

Department Scheme Name Purpose and objectives Value
DfE Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) The main funding for schools, high needs and early years education. £25.9 billion
DfE General Annual Grant (GAG) Main funding for academies. Allocations are net of Pupil Number Adjustment (PNA), Risk Protection Agreement (RPA) etc. £20.7 billion
HO Police Main Grant 2019-20 Statutory funding to all Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) as the Police Main Grant, awarded under statute each year. £4.1 billion
DfE 16-19 Education Fund 16-19 further education and support. £3.8 billion
HO DCLG Funding 2019-20 Part of the Police Grant Report set by the Home Secretary. £2.8 billion
MHCLG Doubling of Small Business Rates Compensates local authorities for Business Rates reliefs given. £2.6 billion
DfE Pupil Premium Funding to improve the attainment of disadvantaged pupils and pastoral support for children of service families. £2.4 billion
HO Police Pensions Annually Managed Expenditure Payment Police Pensions Annually Managed Expenditure Payment. £1.8 billion
BEIS Research England main QR grant 19-20 To support high quality research. Quality-related research (QR) is one half of the dual support system for high quality research. £1.7 billion
MHCLG Local Government DEL Contingency Compensates local authorities for Business Rates reliefs given. £1.6 billion

4. General grants

General grants allow the government to secure policy objectives which the market cannot, such as innovation and research, and they allow an effective funding route for the voluntary and charitable sectors, for example to address homelessness and regional inequalities.

General grants account for 30% (£35.3 billion) of the value of government grants spending and 90% (1,732) of the volume of grant schemes in 2019 to 2020. This is a 6% increase on the value in 2018 to 2019, when £33.3 billion was funded via general schemes.

Figure 4: General grant spend by department.

Source: Accompanying statistical tables – Table 1

The largest general grant funder in 2019 to 2020 was the MHCLG which spent £8.5 billion on general grants. This includes the Better Care Fund Contribution, the Affordable Housing London and the New Homes Bonus, these three schemes account for a combined total of £3.5 billion (around 4% of all general grants funding by value). Outside of the MHCLG, the next largest general grant schemes are the BEIS’s £1.2 billion UKRI - EPSRC Scheme 19-20 and the DfE’s £1.2 billion Apprenticeships Participation 18+ scheme.

4.1 Table 2: The 10 largest general grants schemes

Department Scheme Name Purpose and objectives Value
MHCLG Better Care Fund Contribution The Better Care Support team (BCSt) provides administrative and programme support to the joint MHCLG and DHSC policy for integrating health and social care through the Better Care Fund Contribution. £1.4 billion
BEIS UKRI - EPSRC Scheme 19-20 To provide flexible funding to world-leading research groups to address significant major research challenges. £1.2 billion
MHCLG Affordable Housing London The Affordable Homes Programme provides grant funding to registered providers to support the delivery of affordable housing. £1.2 billion
DfE Apprenticeships Participation 18+ To fund the provision of apprenticeship training. £1.2 billion
BEIS UKRI - Innovate UK grant awards in 19-20 To support high quality innovation and the commercialisation of high quality research. £944 million
MHCLG New Homes Bonus Housing incentive to local authorities for net additional homes added to the council tax base. £918 million
BEIS OFGEM - Non-Domestic Renewable Heat Initiative grant support in 19-20 To support clean and sustainable energy. £846 million
DfE Priority School Building Programme - Private Finance Local Authority & Voluntary Aided School Revenue Grant Revenue funding for private sector organisations as part of Public Private Partnership to maintain the condition of selected repaired schools. £751 million
MHCLG Local Growth Fund The Local Growth Fund is government funding awarded to Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) for projects that benefit the local area and economy. £737 million
MHCLG Homes England - Strategic Deals Provision of affordable housing. £700 million

4.2 General grant awards by allocation method

There are three means by which general grants are allocated to recipients:

  • Competed - applications are invited and evaluated, with awards made based on the outcome of the application. In 2019 to 2020 these grants had a total value of £11.1 billion. Competed grant awards in 2019 to 2020 had an average (median) value of £47,000. As per the Grants Functional Standard, competition should be the default allocation method, wherever appropriate.

  • Un-competed - grants are awarded to a single organisation or individual without a competition, for example where there is only a single organisation that has the capability of delivering the objectives. In 2019 to 2020 these grants had a total value of £13.4 billion. Un-competed grant awards in 2019 to 2020 had an average (median) value of £111,000.

  • Criteria - disseminated based on specific qualifying criteria, for example grants to assist those affected by floods. In 2019 to 2020 these grants had a total value of £9.8 billion. Criteria grant awards in 2019 to 2020 had an average (median) value of £15,000.

Figure 5: Total value of general awards by general allocation method.

Source: Accompanying statistical tables – Table 2

5. Grant awards by COFOG

We can classify grants by their area of economic activity using the Classification of the functions of government (COFOG). COFOG defines the broad objectives of government activity. The UK government classifies £64.0 billion of its grants spending as Education. General public services (£13.1 billion) is the second largest classification and includes grant funding for Foreign economic aid (£8.3 billion). Note this breakdown includes both general and formula awards for the first time.

Figure 6: Value of awards by economic classification (COFOG).

Source: Accompanying statistical tables – Table 3

6. Data Notes

Full notes for each data field are included in the scheme and award level data accompanying this report. Below are the key notes that users should be aware of when interpreting this data:

  • The location recorded on the register is not necessarily reflective of the ultimate beneficiary of grant funding. The address may represent the head office of the initial recipient, rather than where the money is actually spent.
  • Some data has been redacted at both scheme and award level in the published data, where there is a requirement by law and data protection regulations; where data has been redacted at award level but not scheme level, this will result in a difference between scheme-level and award-level data values.
  • Grants-in-aid are excluded from this publication; grants-in-aid are funds allocated from one part of government to another part of government, for example, central government funding for the running costs of non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs).
  • Financial figures can be reported on either a cash or accruals basis. We are working with departments to make this consistent for future publications.
  • Some data is completely redacted for reasons of national security or commercial security. The statistics in this document and the accompanying statistical tables are calculated based on un-redacted data. This means that the statistics in this report won’t completely match the full published dataset.
  • Some recipient information is redacted due to it containing personal information or for national security or commercial security reasons. These details are replaced with [Redacted] in the dataset.
  • Values for schemes and awards that cover multiple years are estimated based on the assumption that the budget is shared equally between financial years during which the scheme or award is active.
  • Average (median) award values only include awards going to organisations, excluding those going to individuals, and are rounded to the nearest thousand.

7. Departmental statements about the data in this report

The following statements have been provided by departments in relation to their data within this publication.

Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy

  • The BEIS data contained within the Government Grants Information System (GGIS), and therefore within this publication, is an approximation of the grant schemes run by BEIS.
  • The awards data covers grants to individual identifiable entities (companies, charities, universities) but excludes awards to persons and consortia. The data excludes non-grant award funding such as funding issued as contracts, loans and operating cost subsidies. Further details of these categories of spending are set out in the Department’s accounts and those of its partner organisations.
  • The core BEIS grants data team is working with the Government Grants Management Function to improve data quality and completeness for the FY 20/21 publication. This is to strive for a better centralised representation of the grants delivered by BEIS, its partner organisations and ALBs.

Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport

  • It is important to note that these figures represent budget figures rather than actuals.
  • Because of the current limitations of GGIS 1.0, certain 3rd party grants which have been uploaded as multi-year have been flat profiled rather than following the actual profile pattern of the grant, this will be remedied in GGIS 2.0 to be launched for 2021 data publication. However, this has resulted in the total budget figure of our awards, being higher than the total budget figure of our schemes.
  • Because of the limitations of DCMS bulk data upload, figures are in some cases to be taken as indicative and if closer examination is required may need to be reviewed. Action is being undertaken to correct this for 2021 data.
  • Recipients of grants from Ofcom have been redacted.

Department of Health and Social Care

  • The Tobacco Burden Grants to Local Authorities of £564,763 has been reported at scheme level only as the breakdown at award level was not readily available at the time of publication.

Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government

  • Grants made or received by Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government are recorded as expenditure or income respectively in the period that the underlying event or activity giving entitlement to the grant occurs.
  • Grants to local authorities include the Revenue Support Grant which finances revenue expenditure and capital grants which finance non-current assets. These are agreed through the local government finance settlement. In addition, specific grants are distributed outside the settlement.
  • Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government Grant-in-Aid payments from the core department to ALBs are paid only when the need for cash has been demonstrated by the body concerned. ALBs treat receipts of Grant in Aid as financing in accordance with the FReM. These transactions are eliminated on consolidation.
  • Grant payments that may need to be recovered from recipients for a variety of reasons depending on the grant conditions. Where recoveries are made, income is recognised at the point that the invoice, or other notice requiring repayment, has been issued.
  • Grant expenditure and income in respect of ERDF is also recognised at the point at which eligibility is determined.
  • The negative values relate to year end accounting adjustments which net off with the overall scheme at programme level. Grant recoveries and ERDF income also contribute to negative grant scheme and award values.
  • Grants made or received by Homes England are recorded as expenditure or income respectively in the period that the underlying event or activity giving entitlement to the grant occurs.
  • Credit values relate to grant payments that may need to be recovered from recipients for a variety of reasons depending on the grant conditions. Where recoveries are made income is recognised at the point that the invoice, or other notice requiring repayment, has been issued.
  • Credit values resulting from year-end accruals and corresponding debits have been removed from this data.
  • Debits shown as ‘grant recoveries’ relate to grants payments made by reducing grants due to be recovered from a particular organisation. An accounting adjustment is made to show these transaction gross, rather than net.

Department for International Trade

  • Investment Promotion Programme - Due to early termination of this programme and due to the type of the trust fund arrangement there is a return of funds from the grant recipient that impacts the final grant amount disbursed. This financial process is still not finalised and therefore we cannot publish the final figures.

Department for International Development

  • DFID and FCO merged in September 2020 creating a new department, the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO). This publication relates to grant spend during 2019/20 therefore data is published under the relevant department as it was at that time. The data contained within the Government Grant Information System (GGIS), and therefore within this Government Grants Register shows a single year snapshot of DFID’s grant spend.
  • DFID does not currently record whether grants are subject to a competitive process or not. This field has been completed as “un-competed” to allow data to be uploaded to GGIS. DFID is exploring options to systematically capture this data in future.
  • Details of all Overseas Development Assistance (ODA), including DFID grant funding, is published to the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) standard on Development Tracker. Further detailed financial information is available in DFIDs Annual Report and Accounts for 2019/20.

HM Revenue & Customs

  • Names and Addresses of the Customs Grant recipients have been redacted as they contain personal information.

Department for Education

  • The DfE return has been produced on an expenditure basis.
  • The data has been provided at a transaction level so there are examples where multiple lines per recipient relate to the same grant.
  • The negative lines in the data refer to accounting adjustments or the return of grant money.
  • The data includes transactions that relate to prior year grants.
  • There are variances between the scheme value and the supporting awards. The variances are due to accounting adjustments that we have been unable to attribute to recipients, or where we have incomplete data.
  • The primary identifier used is the UKPRN. Further information about the recipient can be obtained via the following link https://www.ukrlp.co.uk/.
  • In some cases, the recipient data has been redacted due to its sensitivity or to avoid confusion due to inconsistencies in the GGIS recipient data. These redactions result in either a single line for scheme SCH-000013067 or a line per transaction with recipient information removed for the others.
  1. unless unused or misspent 

  2. a third party that is seperate from the government organisation 

  3. Calculated based on the Office for Budget Responsibility’s Public finances databank figure for total managed expenditure at the time of publication.