The six schools involved in the petition were part of a total of 16 schools whose subsidies for 2010/11 were withdrawn. Taking into account the legislative and regulatory provisions that guide the subsidisation of independent schools, the consistent inadequate performance levels of the schools concerned as well as the procedures followed by the ECDE, it was the opinion of the DBE that the action taken by the ECDE was in line with departmental policy as well as supportive of the continuing quest to ensure improvement in the quality of the output delivered by the education sector as a whole. Furthermore, within this period where provincial education budgets were extremely constrained, it was essential that expenditure was effective and efficient and provided maximum value for money.