Revised white paper: key points
Jess Brown
Tuesday, May 24, 2016
After widespread protest, the government has axed plans to force all schools in England to become academies
Education Secretary Nicky Morgan announced in the House of Commons earlier this month that plans to force all schools to become academies would be scrapped.
Requiring all schools to convert to academies by 2022 was a key measure in Educational Excellence Everywhere, the government’s education white paper published in March.
Yet just days after defending the policy to MPs on the Commons public accounts committee, Morgan was forced to backtrack following widespread criticism and threats of industrial action by head teachers.
She said the government “listened to feedback from MPs, teachers, school leaders and parents”, and had responded to their concerns by amending the plans.
Here we outline some of the key changes for children’s services leaders.
Academisation of coasting schools
The Education and Adoption Bill introduced earlier this year states that all schools that are “coasting” will be forced to become an academy. This will remain the case. However, the government is adding other eligibility criteria and pushing forward its introduction into legislation.
Morgan said the government still wants every school to become an academy by 2022, but that “high-performing schools in strong local authorities will retain the choice of whether to convert”.
“We will seek provisions to convert schools in the lowest performing and unviable authorities to academy status,” she said. “This may involve in some circumstances the conversion of some ‘good’ and ‘outstanding’ schools when they haven’t chosen to do so themselves.
“But the need for action in these limited circumstances is clear because of considerable risk to the standard of education children in those local authorities receive.”
Morgan said the Department for Education will hold a consultation on setting a threshold for underperformance and viability, which it says will be launched “in due course”.
The majority rule
In addition to all schools in an area being turned into academies when the performance of the majority slips below a minimum standard, the revised white paper outlines another set of circumstances that will trigger automatic conversion.
When it is clear that a local authority can no longer viably support its remaining schools because a critical mass of schools in that area have become academies, all schools will be forced to convert.
Mary Bousted, general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, says despite the government’s U-turn over requiring all schools to become academies, it still has concerns over forced academisation.
“There is potential for political shenanigans against local authorities if the government takes powers to force all schools in ‘failing’ local authorities to convert to academy status,” she says.
“We remain deeply concerned that this proposal will put more power into the hands of unelected, unaccountable, regional schools commissioners.”
The Association of Directors of Children’s Services agrees, and says that maintained schools in a good local authority should not be forced to become academies even if the majority of schools in the area have already converted.
Small, rural schools protected
The initial version of the white paper also said that, apart from in exceptional circumstances, small schools would have to form or join a multi-academy trust.
Morgan has now confirmed that no small “successful” schools will be forced to join one.
She also introduced measures to make it more unlikely that small schools in rural areas will close as a result of more schools becoming academies.
“Where small rural schools are converting to academy status, we will introduce a dual lock to ensure protection – both local and national government will have to agree to a school closing before a decision can be made,” Morgan said.
The government also announced a package of measures to “guarantee the continued success” of small rural schools. Hundreds that currently receive no top-up funding to address the “unique pressures” they face will benefit from a new funding formula to guarantee funding, the DfE says.
More than 1,200 of these schools will receive targeted support – which is around 700 more than the number of schools currently receiving the funding, according to the DfE.
Councils will still lose improvement role
The white paper outlines the government’s intentions to transfer responsibility for school improvement from local authorities to schools.
It states: “Local authorities will step back from maintaining schools and school improvement.”
Instead, this will be done locally through groups of head teachers working together or as part of a multi-academy trust.
However, Chancellor George Osborne announced in his latest budget a proposal to cut £600m from the Education Services Grant (ESG) from 2017, which funds school improvement. The ESG is paid to councils and academies to also fund services including education welfare officers, speech therapy, physiotherapy and school place expansion.
Roy Perry, chair of the Local Government Association’s children and young people board, says: “Last year, £815m was spent on ESG, and we are still seeking clarification on how the cuts will be achieved and how quickly, without impacting on welfare and standards.”