Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what guidance her Department provides on the powers (a) she and (b) local education authorities have to remove a school from an academy trust without the agreement of the trust.

Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)

The circumstances in which the department can remove a school from an academy trust without the agreement of the trust are set out in published guidance, which is titled ‘Schools causing concern’. In summary, the department can remove a school in circumstances where my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education’s, powers are triggered to terminate its funding agreement. Academies are accountable to the Secretary of State and therefore local authorities have no powers to remove an academy from a trust.

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will take steps to ensure that academy trusts publish details of (a) how their schools' annual grants are pooled and (b) (i) how and (ii) for what purposes funding is allocated to each school.

Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)

A trust with multiple academies can pool the general annual grant (GAG) to form one central fund. The ability to pool funding gives trusts the ability to direct funds to meet improvement priorities and running costs across its schools and deliver a successful financial operating model for their trust. The Academy Trust Handbook (ATH) requires that if a trust decides to pool their GAG, then it must consider the funding needs and allocations of each constituent academy.

The department requires a high level of accountability and transparency of academy trusts. Academy trusts’ status as companies, charities and public sector bodies, means they have a rigorous tri-partite framework and are held up to greater scrutiny. Trusts must account properly for their money and publish annual accounts, which must set out how much funding was held by each of their academies. In addition, a breakdown of each academy’s income and expenditure is available on the schools financial benchmarking website.

Found: Watch the meeting Members present: Pete Wishart (Chair); Alan Brown; Sally-Ann Hart; Christine Jardine

Found: Costa MP (Conservative, South Leicestershire ) David Duguid MP (Conservative, Banff and Buchan ) Sally-Ann

Found: Members in attendance : •Alan Brown MP •Wendy Chamberlain MP •David Duguid MP •Sally-Ann Hart MP •Christine

Found: Watch the meeting Members present: Pete Wishart (Chair); Alan Brown; Wendy Chamberlain; Sally- Ann Hart

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: David Jones Sir Graham Brady Sir Bill Wiggin Jonathan Gullis Greg Smith Sir Edward Leigh Sally-Ann

Found: David Jones Sir Graham Brady Sir Bill Wiggin Jonathan Gullis Greg Smith Sir Edward Leigh Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: David Jones Sir Graham Brady Sir Bill Wiggin Jonathan Gullis Greg Smith Sir Edward Leigh Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: David Jones Sir Graham Brady Sir Bill Wiggin Jonathan Gullis Greg Smith Sir Edward Leigh Sally-Ann

Found: David Jones Sir Graham Brady Sir Bill Wiggin Jonathan Gullis Greg Smith Sir Edward Leigh Sally-Ann

Found: _NC15 Caroline Ansell Sally-Ann Hart Rachael Maskell Ms Marie Rimmer Robin Millar Bob Blackman

Found: David Jones Sir Graham Brady Sir Bill Wiggin Jonathan Gullis Greg Smith Sir Edward Leigh Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: Simon Fell Selaine Saxby Will Quince Suella Braverman Sir Peter Bottomley Andrew Lewer Sally-Ann

Found: Presented by Lia Nici supported by Sally-Ann Hart, Tom Hunt, Miriam Cates and Martin Vickers