If you’ve heard whispers about a new pot of money called the Inclusive Mainstream Fund and wondered whether it’s a sports grant, you’re not alone, it isn’t.
It’s actually something far more useful for the work you’re already trying to do in your school.
Here’s the good news: it’s a genuine, ready made funding route for exactly the kind of anti-bullying work you’ve probably been trying to squeeze into a tight budget for years.
What is the Inclusive Mainstream Fund?
The Inclusive Mainstream Fund is a new Department for Education grant worth over £500 million a year, given automatically to every mainstream primary and secondary school in England to help build inclusive, supportive school cultures.
Here’s what that means in practice:
- Around £14,000 for an average primary school in 2026 to 2027
- No application needed, it lands in your budget automatically
- Runs for three years, from 2026 to 2029
- Schools must publish a short inclusion strategy on their website by 31 December 2026
There’s no bidding process and no competition with other schools. If you’re a mainstream state funded primary in England, this money is already yours. The only real task is deciding how to spend it well.
Some school leaders, including the Association of School and College Leaders, have also pointed out that the funding is unlikely to stretch far on its own. It’s worth treating this as one useful piece of your inclusion budget rather than the whole answer.
The Seven Principles of Inclusion
The DfE says every pound of this funding must map to one of seven principles:
- Ambitious leadership and governance that embeds inclusion
- Evidence-based support prioritising early intervention
- High-quality adaptive teaching for all learners
- Enriching provision beyond the classroom
- A safe and respectful culture fostering belonging, attendance and participation
- Strong partnerships with families and wider services
- Inclusive environments with continuous accessibility improvements
Principle 5 is the one that matters most for this conversation. It’s the principle that covers bullying, and it’s where anti-bullying work fits most naturally and most strongly.
How Anti-Bullying Workshops and Staff Training Fit
The DfE’s own best-practice guidance for the fund names tackling bullying as a fundable activity under Principle 5. That’s about as clear a green light as you’ll get from a government funding document.
Here’s why anti-bullying work is such a strong match:
- Whole-school workshops build belonging. Interactive, drama-based sessions that help pupils understand bullying and practise being an upstander go directly to the heart of “a safe and respectful culture.”
- Staff training is a direct, practical spend. CPD that equips your team to recognise, respond to and prevent bullying is exactly the kind of investment Principle 5 was designed for.
- It serves your most vulnerable pupils. Children with SEND are around twice as likely to experience bullying as their peers, so anti-bullying provision also directly supports the pupils this fund is most focused on.
- It has to be evidence-informed, and this is. DfE guidance is clear that IMF spend should be backed by evidence. Our workshops draw on research from the Youth Endowment Fund and the Education Endowment Foundation on what actually reduces harmful behaviour, not just awareness raising.
It Also Covers Your Statutory RSHE Duty
There’s a second reason this spend makes sense, and it’s one that’s easy to miss. Under the DfE’s RSHE guidance, which becomes statutory for all primary schools from 1 September 2026, pupils must be taught about different types of bullying, the impact of bullying, and how to get help.
That means booking anti-bullying training doesn’t just tick a box for your inclusion strategy. It also helps you meet a legal teaching requirement you’ll need to have in place anyway. One spend, two jobs done properly.
How to Actually Use the Funding
- Check your allocation lands, expected June or July 2026
- Look at your bullying, attendance and behaviour data to identify where the need is
- Choose an evidence-based activity, such as a workshop or staff CPD session
- Note the spend in your inclusion strategy, published by 31 December 2026
- No external approval needed beyond sign-off from your own leadership and governors
What Schools Could Include in Their Inclusion Strategy
What Schools Could Include in Their Inclusion Strategy
Your inclusion strategy should be in your own words and reflect your own pupils and priorities, so treat the below as a starting framework rather than a script. A strong entry typically covers three things: the barrier you’ve identified, what you’re doing about it, and how it links to belonging and safe culture. For example, you might structure it around:
- The need: what your bullying, behaviour or attendance data is telling you
- The activity: whole-school workshops, staff CPD, parent communication, and how they connect to each other
- The link to Principle 5: how the activity supports a safe, respectful culture where pupils know how to seek help and feel confident to speak up
When it comes to evidencing the spend, you’ll want a simple paper trail ready for governors or Ofsted. Schools can evidence this through:
- Workshop timetable and pupil groups reached
- Staff CPD completion certificates
- Follow-up lesson delivery
- Pupil voice before and after the workshops
- Behaviour, bullying or safeguarding records reviewed over time
- Parent communication sent home
- Inclusion strategy reference to safe and respectful culture
Frequently Asked Questions
Is the Inclusive Mainstream Fund a sports fund? No. It’s a Department for Education schools grant, separate from any Sport England funding of a similar name.
Do we need to apply for it? No. It’s allocated automatically to every eligible mainstream school in England.
Can we spend it on an external anti-bullying provider? Yes. DfE guidance for the fund permits schools to invite external agencies and specialists to lead workshops, and names tackling bullying as fundable activity under Principle 5.
Does it help with our RSHE duty? Yes. Teaching pupils about bullying is a statutory RSHE requirement from September 2026, so this spend supports both your inclusion strategy and your legal teaching duty.
What’s the deadline? Schools must publish their inclusion strategy, covering what they identified and how they spent the fund, by 31 December 2026.
Why This Is a Strong Use of Funding for Primary Schools
Our whole-school anti-bullying package is a practical, whole-school investment for schools that want to support inclusion, culture and pupil wellbeing through a combination of pupil learning, staff training and follow-up resources.
For leaders preparing their inclusion strategy, this gives you a clear, structured and evidence-ready activity that supports one of the DfE’s named themes: creating a safe and respectful culture that fosters belonging and attendance.
It’s worth being precise here. Because there’s no application or approval process for the fund, no provider can promise a package is “definitely eligible”, that decision sits with your school’s leadership and governors. What we can say is this: where a school has identified bullying prevention, pupil belonging, behaviour, wellbeing or inclusive culture as a priority, this programme provides a strong fit with the DfE’s permitted use themes.
Ready to Put Your Fund to Good Use?
You don’t need to write a bid, wait for approval, or compete with other schools for this money. It’s already sitting in your budget, waiting for a clear, evidence-based plan. An anti-bullying workshop and staff training session is about as ready made a fit as you’ll find for Principle 5.
Book an Anti-Bullying Workshop for Your School Here
Sources & Further Reading
- DfE: Inclusive Mainstream Fund 2026 to 2027
- DfE: Inclusive Mainstream Fund, best practice for schools
- DfE: Developing an inclusion strategy using the Inclusive Mainstream Fund
- DfE: Relationships Education, RSE and Health Education statutory guidance (July 2025)
- Anti-Bullying Alliance
Information accurate at the time of this blog posting.
