Commenting on the Education Select Committee’s report into multi
academy trusts, Chris Keates, General Secretary of
the NASUWT, the largest teachers’ union in the UK, said:
“The NASUWT has made the point consistently that there is no
evidence that structural change raises standards or that, across
the board, multi academy trusts are any more successful at
supporting schools than local authorities.
“The haste and aggression with which the Government has pursued
its academisation policy has led to a worrying lack of democratic
oversight of multi academy trusts. There have been serious
concerns about financial practices, admissions arrangements and
working practices in several trusts and greater regulation and
transparency is needed to ensure public confidence that all MATs
operate effectively and in the public interest.
“The Committee suggests that the Government needs to work with
local authorities with strong track records in education to
create MATs, but ministers have spent the last six and half years
systematically stripping councils of many of their resources to
improve education.
“At a time of continued austerity, enormous sums of public money
have been diverted to support the Government’s academisation
programme with little or no evidence that children’s education
has benefited.”
