College additional National Insurance funding for 2025-26
Purpose
- The Scottish Government has provided £1.7 million of additional resource funding to the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) to allocate to colleges in Financial Year (FY) 2025-26 to support the increase in National Insurance (NI) costs. This funding, along with the £5.5m allocated in the College Final Funding Allocations 2025-26 in May 2025, is part of the Government’s commitment to cover 60% of the increase in NI costs.
- I am therefore writing to announce the allocation of this additional funding to colleges.
Additional funding allocations to support NI costs
- Funding has been allocated on the basis of NI cost figures provided by colleges/regions.
- A breakdown of funding allocations for individual colleges/regions is shown in the Annex to this announcement.
Payment of funds
- Funds will be paid in one lump sum in March 2026.
Conditions of funding
- This funding must be used for the purpose for which it is being allocated.
Fair Work
- The Scottish Government expects that all public bodies and those in receipt of public funds should be exemplars, and be able to demonstrate practices, of Fair Work. Recipients of public sector grants are required, as a minimum standard, to comply with the following mandatory criteria:
- Pay at least the Real Living Wage
- Provide appropriate channels for effective workers’ voice, i.e. collectively (e.g. through trade union recognition) and individually (e.g. through staff surveys).
- Recipients of public sector grants are expected to commit to working towards the remaining five desirable Fair Work First criteria.
Further information
- If you require any additional information, please email: funding@sfc.ac.uk, in the first instance.
Liz Welch
Acting Deputy Director of Finance
Annex
| College/Region | Initial allocation for NI costs (May 2025) (£) |
Additional allocation for NI costs (March 2026) (£) |
Total funding for colleges to support NI costs for FY 2025-26 (£) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ayrshire College | 349,692 | 100,724 | 450,416 |
| Borders College | 101,614 | 33,220 | 134,834 |
| Dumfries & Galloway College | 103,463 | 31,241 | 134,704 |
| Dundee & Angus College | 333,323 | 108,391 | 441,714 |
| Edinburgh College | 483,623 | 94,073 | 577,696 |
| Fife College | 401,886 | 78,393 | 480,279 |
| Forth Valley College | 271,300 | 46,367 | 317,667 |
| City of Glasgow College | 519,049 | 162,755 | 681,804 |
| Glasgow Clyde College | 370,342 | 228,752 | 599,094 |
| Glasgow Kelvin College | 229,567 | 74,093 | 303,660 |
| Highlands & Islands Region | 722,880 | 282,744 | 1,005,624 |
| New College Lanarkshire | 404,892 | 111,814 | 516,706 |
| South Lanarkshire College | 140,528 | 1,264 | 141,792 |
| Newbattle Abbey College | 13,654 | 2,426 | 16,080 |
| North East Scotland College | 349,596 | 58,808 | 408,404 |
| Sabhal Mór Ostaig | 40,130 | 16,238 | 56,368 |
| SRUC | 109,497 | 31,382 | 140,879 |
| West College Scotland | 448,560 | 102,486 | 551,046 |
| West Lothian College | 116,405 | 134,827 | 251,232 |
| TOTAL | 5,510,001 | 1,699,998 | 7,209,999 |
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