{"id":239986,"date":"2026-01-09T14:45:51","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T14:45:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/schoolsweek.co.uk\/?p=239986"},"modified":"2026-01-09T14:45:54","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T14:45:54","slug":"new-powers-to-close-academy-trusts-must-be-used-with-caution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/schoolsweek.co.uk\/new-powers-to-close-academy-trusts-must-be-used-with-caution\/","title":{"rendered":"New powers to close academy trusts ‘must be used with caution’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

New powers to allow ministers to close academy trusts for educational failure should be used \u201crarely\u201d and with \u201ccaution\u201d, sector leaders have warned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Presently, ministers can re-broker individual schools from trusts if inspectors find them to be failing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But trusts can only be closed and all their schools moved to other chains in one go following financial or governance failures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government is now poised to hand itself sweeping powers<\/a> to intervene for educational failures at trust level, as part of a government amendment<\/a> to the children\u2019s wellbeing and schools bill that would require Ofsted to regularly inspect academy trusts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leaders have broadly welcomed the move, arguing where schools are inadequately run “there should be a change of governance”, while others stress trusts must not be discouraged from taking on challenging schools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

New powers to terminate agreements<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The proposed legislation<\/a> would require Ofsted to begin inspecting academy trusts’ central teams for the first time, with inspections taking place at regular intervals from as early as next year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It would also give the education secretary new powers to terminate trusts\u2019 funding agreements if Ofsted finds the chain underperforming from an education perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If trust leaders \u201care failing to lead, manage or govern\u201d either the trust or an academy \u201cto an acceptable standard\u201d, Ofsted must notify the education secretary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It must also lay out whether it feels leaders show \u201ccapacity to secure the necessary improvement\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The education secretary may then serve a termination warning notice to the trust. If the trust fails to comply with this notice \u2013 by failing to take specified action, or respond on time \u2013 the secretary of state could terminate its academy funding agreement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Pepe Di’Iasio<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Its academies would be moved to a strong trust, and the department would support this process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pepe Di\u2019Iasio, the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said once there was \u201ca proportionate and effective system\u201d in place, it would seem appropriate to consider how trust level intervention might need to change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But this must be done carefully. Trusts must not be discouraged from taking on schools in challenging circumstances, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTrust level intervention would clearly have significant ramifications and we would expect the secretary of state to use these powers very rarely.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

‘Caution will be essential’<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Steve Rollett, the deputy chief executive of the Federation of School Trusts, said the power to intervene at trust level “is important, and caution will be essential as these new powers are rolled out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEngland\u2019s education system is good and moving towards being great, so we should not anticipate these powers being used frequently,” he added. “Getting the threshold for intervention right will be crucial.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Michael Barton, head of policy and impact at the National Governance Association, said if a trust inspection identified significant trust-wide concerns, it was appropriate that it lead to proportionate trust-wide intervention \u201cjust as it does where Ofsted currently identifies significant concerns at the school level\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many trust leaders have welcomed the proposals, while awaiting further detail that will be in the inspection framework.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

‘Closure is to be expected if a MAT’s not working’<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Sir Jon Coles, chief executive of United Learning, said “anyone with the interests of children at heart” would agree “there should be a change of governance of schools which are inadequately run, and where a governance authority is systematically failing to run schools adequately, the schools it is responsible for should be removed from its jurisdiction and run by someone else.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Paul Stone, the chief executive of Nene Education Trust, said while \u201ca big change\u201d, the proposal would level the playing field between academies and maintained schools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Paul
Paul Stone<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere are failing maintained schools and there are failing academies,\u201d he said. \u201c[Closure] is to be expected, if a MAT\u2019s not working.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DfE said MAT inspections \u201cwill raise standards in education\u201d and \u201cmake the system fairer [and] more transparent\u201d, helping to close what it described as a \u201cgap in accountability\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is not right that\u2026the overall approach taken at trust-level by members, trustees and senior executives is not eligible for independent inspection.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a DfE document laying out guiding principles for the policy, the department agreed the approach “should not act as a disincentive for strong trusts to take struggling\/poorly performing schools into their trust”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There “must be an inbuilt understanding that improvement takes time, and
a focus on improvement trajectory, not just absolute outcomes,” it added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

‘We need confidence in the methodology’<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Caroline Barlow and Keziah Featherstone, joint chairs of the Headteachers\u2019 Roundtable, said they were \u201cbroadly\u2026supportive of the move in principle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Caroline Barlow and Keziah Featherstone<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMATs should be accountable for the role they play in the system, especially given the transfer of funding from schools to central services. However, we have to have confidence in the methodology and implementation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhilst there are still significant question marks about the new framework and subjectivity in its application, given the known influence of some big MATs there are a number of concerns and questions that remain unanswered.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some other leaders have raised concerns about the proposed intervention powers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stuart Lock, chief executive of Advantage Schools, said he was \u201cbroadly sympathetic to ministers having the ability to intervene in the genuinely rare cases where a trust is failing on educational standards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe issue for me isn\u2019t the principle of intervention, but the mechanism being proposed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lock said inspecting trusts as well as schools \u201cdoesn\u2019t materially solve that problem. It creates another layer of performance measurement when schools and trusts are already subject to extensive scrutiny. We don\u2019t have a lack of data about educational standards; we have plenty of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf the amendment were focused on giving ministers clearer, faster powers to act where standards across a group of schools are demonstrably poor, I\u2019d be inclined to support that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs it stands, however, this risks duplicating Ofsted\u2019s work and increasing workload for both Ofsted and trusts, without directly addressing the underlying issue it\u2019s trying to fix.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fears over ‘rushed’ policy<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Baroness Barran, the former academies minister and now shadow education minister, described the policy as “rushed…with many more questions than answers”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“If you are going to inspect all MATs, then you should inspect all school groups including LAs and federations,” she said. This is something CST has also previously argued.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Barran also questioned why the changes weren’t considered alongside Ofsted’s recent education inspection overhaul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A MAT inspection is largely the sum of its school inspections and there will now be totally avoidable duplication. Why wasn\u2019t this thought through at the time of changing the school inspection framework?”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sector responds to news government is set to gain new intervention powers once MAT inspections start<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":314902,"featured_media":193767,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[32,25],"post-theme":[2381],"class_list":["post-239986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-academies","tag-ofsted","post-theme-academies"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t