Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department is taking steps to increase the accountability of executive heads of multi-academy trusts.

The Department requires a high level of accountability and transparency from academy trusts. Academy trusts’ status as companies, charities and public sector bodies means they are all subject to rigorous accountability systems. The explicit responsibilities of trust executive leaders as Accounting Officers are set out in the Academy Trust Handbook.

Where non-financial or financial non-compliance or governance failure is identified, including by trust executive leaders, Regions Group or the Education and Skills Funding Agency respectively will intervene in a way that is proportionate to the risk and preserves education provision. This can include issuing a trust with a Notice to Improve or, in the most serious cases, termination of the Funding Agreement.

To strengthen the support for executive head teachers and Chief Executive Officers (CEOs), the Department is introducing a new Multi Academy Trust CEO Development programme. The Department has convened an expert panel across school leadership and business to codify the knowledge, skills, and behaviours of a CEO of a large trust into the new ‘Multi Academy Trust Leadership Development: CEO Content Framework’. The document includes the need for robust internal structures for a trust’s board to hold the CEO to account.