---
title: "Good news: one fewer return"
description: LBCT is paused for autumn 2026 and no successor has been named. What academy trusts should keep, and why the records still matter, from Statlog
image: https://statlog.co.uk/hubfs/pause.png
---

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# Good news: one fewer return

 by [**Richard Melis**](https://statlog.co.uk/statlog-news-insights/author/richard-melis) on 30 Sept 2026, 09:38:19

Some people mark the arrival of autumn by the leaves changing colour. Academy trusts have traditionally had LBCT.

It stands for the Land and Buildings Collection Tool: the DfE return used by academy trusts to report their land, buildings and leased assets.\[1\]\[9\]

If it normally lands on your desk each autumn, you’ll be pleased to hear that it will not be published in autumn 2026. Please celebrate responsibly.

DfE is reviewing how it collects estates data from academy trusts. It wants to reduce duplication and take account of changes to charity and lease accounting. It has promised an update by the end of the year, but has not named a return date or announced a replacement.\[1\]

That sounds like one less job. It is not quite that simple.

DfE is clear that trusts remain responsible for maintaining the information they need to manage their estate effectively and meet financial reporting requirements.\[1\] Meanwhile, the first SEMS annual return has opened, CDC2 is approaching its conclusion and DfE has published a new property data model.

The form has disappeared. The paperwork has not.

### What the pause does not remove

LBCT collected details of academy trusts’ land, buildings, occupation arrangements and leased assets for the sector accounts and National Audit Office evidence.\[2\]\[9\]

DfE says revised lease-accounting requirements in FRS 102 and upcoming changes to the Charities SORP are factors in its review. It may eventually collect the same information through LBCT or another process.\[1\]\[10\]

The return also forced trusts to assemble the evidence behind their answers. An annual deadline has one useful quality: eventually someone has to open the property folder.

SEMS does not fill that gap.

The School Estate Management Standards annual return asks whether a trust holds information about tenure, leases, ownership, asset registers, building layout plans and condition surveys. It does not collect those records or their contents.\[3\]\[4\]

SEMS measures estate-management practice. LBCT recorded the assets and occupancy arrangements behind it.

Treating one as a replacement for the other would therefore leave a gap.

### The wider change in estate data

CDC2 has given DfE a national picture of school-building condition and informed condition-funding allocations. But it does not replace local surveys, and its information becomes less current as buildings change.\[5\]\[8\]

DfE’s Education Estates Strategy says responsible bodies will increasingly collect and maintain their own estate data, in line with common standards. Pilots are planned for 2026–27, with national rollout planned from autumn 2027, two-way data sharing intended by 2028 and full coverage targeted for 2029–30. DfE says the data sharing will reduce the burden of ad hoc and duplicative data collections.\[6\]

DfE has also published a common property data model. It is intended to connect estate information and preserve its history when sites and buildings transfer between schools, colleges or responsible bodies.\[7\]

DfE says its LBCT review forms part of the Education Estates Strategy and aims to reduce duplication. It points trusts to the estate management standards, but has not named SEMS, CDC2 or the property data model as LBCT’s replacement.\[1\]

Taken together, though, they point in the same direction: responsible bodies keeping accurate estate information themselves, ready to share when required.

### This could affect more than reporting

From autumn 2028, DfE plans to replace the Condition Improvement Fund with a programme that will not require eligible bodies to submit full bids.

The Education Estates Strategy says this will be enabled by more granular and timely information collected by responsible bodies and shared with the department.\[6\]

That is why the LBCT pause matters.

Accurate estate information is not only needed for an accounting return. It may increasingly help DfE understand condition need and decide where public money should go.

One fewer annual return may mean less work this autumn. The wider change places more responsibility on trusts to keep their records current between national collections.

### What trusts should keep

Until DfE explains what happens next, trusts should retain and review:

- title records and Land Registry documents
- leases, licences and church agreements
- site and building plans
- records of acquisitions, disposals and transfers
- asset registers
- information about other leased tangible assets
- CDC2 reports and local condition surveys
- evidence used for previous LBCT submissions

Those records should also be connected to the correct site and building.

A folder full of documents is not the same as a usable estate record, particularly when three of the documents disagree.

This is especially important where schools have transferred between trusts, buildings sit on more than one title, occupation depends on several agreements or responsibility for repairs is divided between different parties.

LBCT may return. Its questions may be absorbed into another collection. What follows may not resemble an annual return at all.

Before deleting anything with “LBCT” in the filename, resist the unusually satisfying urge.

The form is on pause. The data is merely between deadlines.

---

 

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---

#### Sources

1. Department for Education, [Academies land and buildings collection tool](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/academies-land-and-buildings-collection-tool), updated 30 July 2026.
2. Department for Education, [Land and buildings collection tool: summary guidance for academies](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/academies-land-and-buildings-collection-tool/land-and-buildings-collection-tool-summary-guidance-for-academies), updated 30 July 2026.
3. Department for Education, [School estate management standards annual return](https://www.gov.uk/guidance/school-estate-management-standards-annual-return), updated 22 September 2026.
4. Department for Education, [School estate management annual return questions](https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6a79ebc3c5cca217fbd7a064/School_estates_management_annual_return_questions.pdf).
5. Department for Education, [Condition Data Collection 2 programme](https://www.gov.uk/guidance/condition-data-collection-2-cdc2-programme).
6. Department for Education, [Education Estates Strategy: a decade of national renewal](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/education-estates-strategy/education-estates-strategy-a-decade-of-national-renewal).
7. Department for Education, [Education estates property data model](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/education-estates-property-data-model/education-estates-property-data-model), published 26 August 2026.
8. Department for Education, [Condition funding methodology and spend guidance 2026 to 2027](https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/69c2a9363ed0546101e0dbdd/Condition_funding_methodology_and_spend_guidance_2026_to_2027.pdf).
9. Department for Education, [Land and buildings collection tool: leased asset guidance](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/academies-land-and-buildings-collection-tool/land-and-building-collection-tool-leased-asset-guidance), updated 30 July 2026.
10. Financial Reporting Council, [FRS 102 Explainer: a summary of the Periodic Review 2024 changes for financial statements users](https://media.frc.org.uk/documents/FRS_102_updates_explainer_June_2026.pdf), published 30 June 2026.

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