Independent Schools: Regulation of Proprietors

Debate between Mary Kelly Foy and Jim Shannon

Tuesday 7th July 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mary Kelly Foy]

I thank my hon. Friend for the intervention. I completely agree. The way in which the company has acted towards pupils, parents and staff is outrageous. The least it could do is to provide some clarity and support going forward. Later in my speech, I will ask the Minister about some lessons that can be learned.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Lady on securing this debate. She has brought to the attention of the House and the Minister to something that is incredibly important: the takeover of any school with little or no discussions with the staff, the principal, or the board of governors, little or no contact with the parents, and certainly no talk or discussions with those who have input into the school. Does she share my concern—I believe that she will—that when influences from outside this country have bought a school, through whatever the allegedly nefarious process may be, the only way in which that can be stopped is for the Government and our Minister to bring in legislation that ensures that it cannot happen over the heads of local people at a school of historical importance?

[Mary Kelly Foy]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. It seems that this overseas company had no intention of educating our children in the UK, and legislation should be strengthened or put in place to stop this happening again.

It is as though GGE saw the fallout of their decision to inform Malvern in advance and attempted to hide from any further scrutiny by giving the other schools zero notice. It is abhorrent. When I contacted GGE’s directors to demand answers, they were at pains to point out to me that they have done all they can to support staff and families. They even alluded to the Government’s introduction of VAT on independent school fees. That is nonsense. Since the VAT changes were announced, Durham high school’s roll only dipped from 288 to 281—a net loss of just seven pupils. The school has a physical capacity for 650 pupils, and a financial break-even point of roughly 350. A senior staff member said in their parting message:

“Whatever you read, this isn’t a VAT story. It isn’t a falling rolls or unstoppable decline story. The truth is deeper, and more complex, and eventually truth will out.”

It seems clear that there was never any genuine effort by GGE to make this school a success. Speaking to union representatives at the school, I am told that repeated requests to see even a basic plan for how the company would secure the school’s future were rebuffed.

What do we know about GGE? Very little seems to be the answer. It was only incorporated in the UK in April 2025, and I understand that it has not yet been possible to assess its level of available cash, debt levels, profitability or inter-company lending. The structure of the company seems equally opaque, spread across several companies, school-operating companies and overseas interests. One of those beneficial owners ultimately traces back to the Cayman Islands, with no transparency at that point.

What is clear is that one person holds a significant amount of power, and they were the person with overall control of the school until its closure. Shangqin Gao, a Chinese national, holds roughly 75% of GGE’s shares. As I understand it, the school has had no contact with this person. The House may note that this individual is also linked to two other businesses: Shine Space Management Ltd and Galaxy Capital Real Estate. The latter was incorporated only two years before the purchase of Durham high school.

All this background leads us to the crux of the situation: more than 280 children have been left stranded without a school, staff have been left without jobs and young women who sat their public exams this summer may not even be able to collect their results in the school where they studied. Local suppliers have been left facing significant losses due to unpaid invoices. Crucially, children with additional needs who thrived in this intimate environment have been thrown into limbo. They must now search for alternative specialist provision potentially miles away from home, or face being absorbed into mainstream settings.

Our local secondary state schools that provide top-class education and often win prestigious awards—such as St Leonard’s, Durham Johnston and Belmont—are all just about full. There is not enough capacity to easily absorb these pupils. As well as throwing these families into crisis, GGE has also heaped pressure on the local authority. Will the Minister liaise with Durham county council to ensure that the admissions team is appropriately supported?

The conduct of GGE in the final days, weeks and months of the school’s operation reveals the true nature of this business.

As the company ran down the school, the financial team carefully managed the remaining funds to ensure they could pay staff salaries for June, despite GGE blocking the school from paying suppliers. Yet days before payroll was due, an unexpected invoice was received from GGE that would have wiped out those payments entirely, and GGE required the massive bill to be paid that same day. Thankfully, the school business manager prioritised the livelihoods of the hard-working staff, paid the wages and ignored the demand. However, in a final blow to devastated staff, I heard just yesterday that the administrators have informed them they cannot claim unpaid salaries for July and August, despite already carrying out their work for the academic year.

A cynical mind would look at how Durham Education Limited was put into administration and conclude that it benefits a parent company to position itself as a major debtor upon any future sale, especially when the ultimate ownership of the land is in doubt. Despite assurances from GGE, the entire debacle bears the hallmarks of a land grab. In Durham, the prime real estate on which Farewell Hall sits is estimated to be worth around £10 million. That brings me to the core question: what can the Government do to stop predatory overseas companies asset-stripping our educational institutions and treating our children’s futures as real estate speculation?

Schools such as Durham high served as a safety valve for the local authority's overstretched school place allocations. Despite that, entire families have been thrown to the wolves so that an overseas corporate entity can access prime land on the edge of a historic city centre. Section 128 of the Education and Skills Act 2008 rightly gives the Secretary of State for Education the power to bar unsuitable individuals from managing independent schools. Yet with the opaque structure of the business and the fact GGE has been able to rapidly churn through directors at Companies House, shuffling responsibilities and moving its statutory administrative offices to anonymous London addresses, it seems that oversight on such businesses is patchy. How can we ensure in the future that what has happened in Durham, Malvern and Ruthin does not happen elsewhere?

To be clear, my key asks of the Minister are as follows. Will the Minister help families in Durham, Ruthin and Malvern get clarity on what steps were taken by the Department for Education, Estyn and Ofsted to ensure the suitability of GGE? Will the Minister commit to reviewing the governance structure of all the affected schools? Will she advise me whether an independent investigation could be called into GGE’s management of Durham, Malvern and Ruthin to establish exactly what happened? Will she advise me on efforts that the Government, the local authority or the school community can take to preserve the Durham high school site for educational use, rather than allow a historical education asset to disappear? Finally, will the Minister take steps to close corporate loopholes and ensure proper regulation is in place for foreign investors in UK schools? We need robust legal mechanisms within the DFE to prevent foreign capital from severing historical school properties from their educational purposes. We need statutory protections that stop predatory owners transferring freeholds out of educational charities into private, for-profit shell companies.

What happened at Durham high school will not simply go away. My constituents may be down but they are certainly not out, and they are driven by a desire for justice. Though they understand it may be too late for their beloved school, they wish no other family or hard-working member of school staff to have to go through the pain and uncertainty that they have felt.

Last Friday, my team joined families, pupils, staff and trade unionists outside the school gates for a final act of solidarity. The compassion, mutual respect and dignity that was on display is something that GGE would do well to learn from. I am sure that all of us across the House might agree that no matter the nature of the establishment, the education of our children is a public good, not a real estate portfolio. What happened to Durham, Ruthin and Malvern cannot be allowed to happen again.

I will close with the words of Mrs Middleton, the acting head for the school’s final weeks, who has been highly commended for the compassion and dedication that she has shown to the entire school community during the most horrendous circumstances:

“On the final day we came together. Of course, there was sadness. There were tears. But there was also laughter, celebration, joy, and a deep sense of knowing one another. The hardest words I have had to say over these past few weeks were: “It’s time to go.” No one moved. So I left the stage, and Mrs Rochester and I walked the children out. Senior Leaders had planned to stand outside, greet parents and clap the children out. All the staff joined us. And for over an hour we clapped, talked, cried, hugged and clapped again. In that hour there was no complaining. No anger. Just togetherness. A community to the very end.”

County Durham: Cultural Opportunities

Debate between Mary Kelly Foy and Jim Shannon

Tuesday 20th January 2026 Westminster Hall

[Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)]

That this House has considered cultural opportunities in County Durham.

I am grateful to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Vaz, and I am pleased to have the opportunity to bring this debate to the House. To many, culture is an add-on: a luxury for when times are good or a line item to be trimmed when budgets are tight. In County Durham, we know better. For us, culture is the thread weaving through our communities. It is our history, our pride and our future. It does not just inform what we do; it defines who we are.

To understand why culture matters, one must look to the history of the Durham miners. They did not just extract coal; they built entire communities. They created a welfare state long before 1945: out of their own pockets, through subscriptions and solidarity, they built the institutes, the schools and the libraries that stand today as monuments to self-improvement and collective dignity. They knew that a person needs more than just a wage; they need a sense of belonging. They knew that they had to nourish the mind as well as the body.

That culture lives on in the newly refurbished Redhills—the pitman’s parliament. My constituency office is in Redhills and I never fail to be struck by the fact that it was built by the pennies of pitmen. It is a beacon of working-class heritage and culture. That spirit is reflected in the continued success of the Durham miners’ gala, the big meeting, which was first held in 1871. It has survived strikes, wars and the closure of pits to remain the largest celebration of trade union culture in Europe. From the blessing of the banners at the cathedral to the brass bands on the racecourse, it is a reminder that although the pits might be gone, our solidarity is permanent.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Lady, who I spoke to before the debate, for recognising the cultural attachments that we all have. I know she is aware that County Durham and Northern Ireland share deep-rooted cultural parallels, largely shaped by their industrial heritage, strong community identity and significant historical migration—many families from Northern Ireland are in Durham, and vice versa. Does she agree that to make the best of such areas’ attractions, we must fully fund tourism and investment? That will not only preserve the past, but provide a future for her people.

[Mary Kelly Foy]

I could not agree more. I will go on to talk about the diversity in Durham, with the Irishmen, those from Northern Ireland and those from Scotland who came to the north-east to work in our shipyards, our mines and our steelworks. We need to remember that heritage and culture—and, yes, it is something for tourists to enjoy as well.

Alongside the proud heritage of the mines, left to us by those miners, we also have the legacy of rail, left to us by the pioneering spirit of George Stephenson and others.

Woman and Equality: North of England

Debate between Mary Kelly Foy and Jim Shannon

Tuesday 5th November 2024 Westminster Hall

[Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered inequalities faced by women in the north of England.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sirusb Christopher. This debate is about the “Woman of the North” report, published in September 2024 by Health Equity North. I thank Health Equity North for the report and for their support for today’s debate, as well as all those who contributed to that vital research.

Women in the north of England face unequal challenges and inequalities in their lives and their health, compared with the rest of the country. They are more likely to work more hours for less pay and be in worse health. They are also more likely to be an unpaid carer, live in poverty and have fewer qualifications. In fact, the inequality between women living in the north of England and those in the rest of the country has grown over the past decade. It has harmed women’s quality of life and work and harmed their communities and families.

Today, I am going to debate the key findings of the research and highlight the report’s recommendations. The report does not make for easy reading. Even though the Minister, like me, will be all too aware of the impact of austerity on our communities, many of the findings will, I am sure, come as a shock, as they did for me.

I will not be able to cover everything, but I hope the debate will begin a dialogue between the Department and the contributors to this important research.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Lady for bringing this issue forward. First, there is an anomaly—there are two and a half times more self-employed men than women, with jobs and opportunities. Women have the skills and the talent, but one of the things that holds them back is childcare. It does not matter where someone is in this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland: if they do not have childcare, they have nothing—they cannot get the opportunities. Last week on the TV it said that the cost of childcare for some families is as much as the mortgage. That is a massive issue.

[Mary Kelly Foy]

I could not agree more. That is why I am pleased that the Labour Government will be bringing in thousands of new nursery places and breakfast clubs, which will hopefully alleviate some of the problems of childcare. I know that childcare is an issue not just in the north of England but also in the north of Ireland.

I shall begin with employment. Employment rates for women in the north are lower than the national average of 72.2%. In my region, the north-east, the rate is just under 70%; in Yorkshire and the Humber, it is just over 70%; and in the Minister’s region, the north-west, it is just over 71%.

Disability and long-term sickness is a major issue in the north. All northern regions have levels of disability and long-term sickness higher than the national average, and considerably higher than the south-east. The report states that the resulting estimated economic cost is around £0.4 billion per annum. Compounding that is the fact that the median weekly wage for women in the north is below the national average for both full-time and part-time employment. For instance, the average weekly wage for a full-time working woman in the north-east is £569. That is much lower than the national average of £625 and considerably lower than the average weekly wage for women in London, £757. Overall, women in the north could be losing out on around £132 million a week.

In terms of education, the number of women without qualifications is higher in the north than it is in the south and the south-east. That leads to the next point about women and poverty—an issue that is worth its own debate. A higher percentage of families in the north are on universal credit than in regions in the south. In fact, the average number of families on universal credit across the north is 3% higher than in the south. The figure is even higher if London is excluded.

All 12 local authorities in the north-east have rates of absolute child poverty above the English average. By contrast, all 30 local authorities in the south-west have rates of absolute child poverty below the English average.

The north is also the region of unpaid care, with 12% of women in the north-east providing it—just under 2% higher than the national average. Health Equity North estimates that women in the north are providing around £10 billion a year in unpaid care. Harrowingly, it also estimates that, in the last decade, the life expectancy of girls born in the north of England has begun to stall and in some cases decrease. In addition, girls born in the north will not live as long in good health compared with the national average. For older women, menopause is often cited as a potential driver of change in women’s health, which makes it all the more concerning that there are regional differences in levels of hormone replacement therapy, with lower levels of HRT being prescribed in the north of England.

The picture is even more bleak when we consider pregnancy and reproductive health. We have seen the biggest increase in abortion rates between 2012 and 2021, and there has been a demonstrable relationship between austerity, the implementation of the Tory two-child limit and the increased rate of abortions. I should also add that the two-child limit itself affects over a million children in the country, and it impacts over 60,000 babies, children and young people in the north-east alone. Right now, over 25% of pregnant women in the north of England are living in the most deprived 10% of areas, with 40% of pregnant women living in the top 20% most destitute areas. Tragically, stillbirths are the highest in the most deprived communities, and highest among black African and Caribbean women living in the areas of greatest deprivation. Also, women living in poverty are at increased risk of death and depression. Subsequently, babies are at a higher risk of stillbirth, neonatal death, pre-term delivery and low birth weight.

The report also refers to smoking and pregnancy; I am glad to see that the Tobacco and Vapes Bill will receive its First Reading today. It would be good to hear from the Minister whether the Government will continue to fund the financial incentives scheme for pregnant smokers.

Women in the north of England have the highest rates of domestic violence abuse in the country, which is something that many children are exposed to. That also deserves its own debate. When we consider mental health, the report highlights that, in a cohort of over a million women aged between 16 and 65, from 2005 to 2018, the prevalence of mental illness was higher in three northern regions compared with the south of England. With severe mental illnesses, such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, the north-west and the north have higher prevalence rates. Lastly, the report covers the reality of marginalised women in the north, which includes a range of areas, from criminal justice to education and health, as well as issues related to homelessness and substance abuse. I do not have time to go into each point, but I encourage the Minister to read that section if he has not already, and I will either write to him about those issues or table parliamentary questions.

The report’s recommendations are spread across multiple departmental areas, so the Minister may want to follow up in writing if he prefers. One key recommendation of the “Woman of the North” report is that central Government should deliver a national health inequalities strategy—one that convenes Government Departments from across Whitehall to put health at the heart of all policies to address the wider determinants of health. Many of the policies announced in the Budget, as well as the Employment Rights Bill, will be welcome, such as uprating universal credit in line with inflation and tackling zero-hours contracts. Of course, we wait in anticipation for the child poverty taskforce strategy next year, and I sincerely hope that we will see an end to the Tory two-child limit. In addition, the report recommends that the Treasury should consider targeted support for pregnant women, as well as improving childcare. When it comes to local and regional government, which I know the Minister has experience in, the report suggests targeted support delivered to 11 to 18-year-olds through careers hubs in the areas of greatest deprivation and a higher level of the adult education budget for the north. Greater support is also required for women navigating the social security system and for social security uptake, and for women to transition back to their families and integrate into their communities after involvement in the criminal justice system.

Finally, with health and social care, NHS England could provide additional support and investment for women’s health hubs, and health services should be supported to collect routine data on ethnicity and other key demographic data. That would help deliver better information for service development and improve our understanding of different health needs. It would also explore the ways in which the services’ work can be adapted to address health inequalities across different population groups, with examples including providing cultural sensitivity training, adopting a trauma-informed approach to care and promoting person-centred approaches.

I have been an MP since 2019 and have spoken about health inequalities ever since I was elected. Today’s debate is not pleasant, but I am genuinely hopeful that we can turn a page under a Labour Government. We have already seen positive measures, such as those in the Employment Rights Bill and the Budget. I look forward to the Minister’s reply and hope to work with him alongside Health Equity North to deliver happiness and dignity for women in the north, which is long overdue.