While councils have a statutory duty to ensure there is a school place for every child, they are currently not able to direct academies to expand school places or admit individual pupils. We are seeking a commitment from Government redress this discrepancy between councils’ duties and powers as soon as reasonably possible, by providing councils with sufficient backstop powers to direct academies to expand school places and admit individual pupils, within six months of the Act passing.
In the event that the results of future Government consultations on the direct National Funding Formula conclude that local authorities would be best placed to determine and administer certain aspects of school funding, this amendment enables the Secretary of State to lay regulations to delegate responsibility for calculating and administering these aspects of funding to local authorities for schools within their area.
This amendment aims to clarify the provisions on school attendance orders to ensure that school attendance orders are only issued when in the opinion of the local authority this course of action is in the best interest of the child, in addition to being expedient.
This Government amendment would reduce the obligation on parents to provide information, on request from a local authority, in cases where the child is on the at home register.
As such, parents of children who are out of school or electively home-educated would only have a duty to provide councils with information prescribed in regulations under 436(1)(a) to (c). This is limited to the child’s name, date of birth and home address; the name and home address of each parent of the child; and such details of the means by which the child is being educated as may be prescribed.
Amendment 33 would ensure that a local authority cannot apply for an Academy order, unless it has the consent of the governing body of the school.
Amendment 34 would seek to ensure that before a local authority can apply to the Secretary of State for an Academy order to be made in respect of any of its maintained schools, the parents and staff of the school must be properly consulted.
The current school system is not working for all children, particularly those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) and those from disadvantaged backgrounds. The Schools White Paper, which underpins the Bill, sets out the Governments proposals for reforming the schools system and ensure all children have equal opportunity to achieve their potential. The Levelling Up mission for schools is for 90 per of children to leave primary school having achieved the expected standard in reading, writing and maths by 2030, up from 65 per cent in 2019, and this will be the key measure of the White Paper’s success. The Government aims to achieve this through driving high standards of curriculum, behaviour and attendance and providing targeted support for every child that needs it.
The LGA supports these ambitions. However, it is important that they are delivered in a way that that supports the objectives of the SEND and Alternative Provision Green Paper to create a more inclusive mainstream school system in which all children can succeed. Numerous reviews and inquiries into the education system have found that the current performance and funding system does not incentivise or support schools to be inclusive or take responsibility for the needs of all children, and it is vital that this is addressed. With academic attainment, behaviour and attendance as the core benchmarks of school performance, there is a risk that the Government’s reforms will continue to dis-incentivise schools from becoming more inclusive of children who do not, or cannot, meet these standards.
One lever Government has to ensure mainstream schools become more inclusive is through the new regulation framework for academy trusts. The Government has set out its intention to remove the clause 1-18 of the Bill, including provisions relating to the introduction of academy trust standards. The Government plans to use the Regulatory and Commissioning Review to develop reformed proposals for academy standards, which they will re-introduce in the House of Commons. It is vital that these standards support and enable schools to become more inclusive, meet children’s diverse needs and reduce the number of pupils excluded from school. We look forward to working with the Government on the detail of these proposals when they are brought forward.
More broadly, there are various other reforms that Government could consider to achieve these objectives, including recognising and rewarding greater curriculum breadth; rewarding schools for inclusive practice through the accountability system; investing in pastoral and mental health support and significantly developing trauma informed practice in schools.
Email: megan.edwards@local.gov.uk
