The Education Reform(Northern Ireland) Order 1989

Grants for provision of educational or library services, etc.

159.  For Article 115 of the principal Order there shall be substituted the following Article—

“Grants for educational or library services, etc.

115.— (1) Subject to paragraph (3), the Department may, in accordance with regulations made with the approval of the Department of Finance and Personnel, pay grants to persons in respect of expenditure incurred or to be incurred by them—

(a) for the purposes of, or in connection with, the provision (or proposed provision) of—

(i) educational or library services; or

(ii) recreational, social, cultural, physical or youth service activities or services ancillary to education;

(b) for the purposes of research relevant to the functions of the Department or of boards under the Education Orders.

(2) Regulations under paragraph (1) may prescribe the rates of grants which may be paid under that paragraph.

(3) The Department shall not pay grants under this Article to—

(a) a board; or

(b) the trustees or managers of—

(i) a voluntary school; or

(ii) a grant-maintained integrated school.

(4) Paragraph (5) applies where—

(a) the Department has, after the coming into operation of Article 159 of the 1989 Order, paid a grant under this Article to a person in respect of expenditure incurred or to be incurred by him for the provision or alteration of premises; and

(b) those premises cease to be used for approved purposes.

(5) Where this paragraph applies there shall be payable to the Department by the person to whom the grant was paid or his successor in title such sum as the Department considers equitable but not exceeding such proportion of the value of the premises as the proportion that the amount of the grant was of the approved cost of the provision or alteration of the premises together with interest on that sum from the date on which the premises ceased to be used for approved purposes until the date of payment to the Department.

(6) For the purposes of paragraph (5) the value of premises shall be taken to be the amount which the premises might be expected to realise if sold in the open market on the date on which the premises ceased to be used for approved purposes and where the Department certifies that it is not possible to reach agreement as to such value, the dispute as to such value may be referred to and determined by the Lands Tribunal for Northern Ireland.

(7) For the purposes of paragraph (5) interest shall be at such rate as may from time to time be determined by the Department of Finance and Personnel under paragraph 18(2) of Schedule 6 to the Local Government Act (Northern Ireland) 1972(1).

(8) Any sum payable or repayable to the Department under this Article may be recovered as a debt due to the Department.”.

(1)

SR 1978 No. 217