The Conservatives are now moving fast to take control of what may remain of the UK.
Now they’ve cowbarred us out of Europe, a whole raft of human rights legislation will no longer be available to protect people from government excess – and that includes their take-over of our schools.
It was only last October that David Cameron announced he wanted “every school to become an Academy” – in other words, to be cut loose from local councils and democratic oversight, and controlled directly by the Department for Education. Then in March, the Conservative Government announced this would indeed be national policy.
The academisation of British schools is just one example of how control by local elected councils is being replaced by direct control by Whitehall and the Cabinet Office.
In the face of protests – including from their own councillors and MPs – the Government appeared to soften. Only ‘failing schools’ would be forced to become academies, they said. However this apparent U-turn is not what it seems.
Just as the initial impetus towards academy status was kick-started by altering funding arrangements, so it is still within the Government’s power to force change through by financial means. And just to help the Government takeover of our schools to go through, two decisions will increase the pressure.
The first is that parent governors will be phased out by 2022 and if all that doesn’t give the Government enough cards to win the game, it has dealt itself a Jester.
And then secondly, once a Local Authority reaches a point – perhaps as high as 50% – where the number of non-academy schools is lower than some Government benchmark – then the LEA itself will be declared ‘non-viable’ and, willy-nilly the remaining schools will have no choice left. Without an LEA to be responsible for local education, then academisation will become automatic.
It is expected that Multi-School Academy Trusts will be empowered to move in and mop up the stragglers – like small rural schools for example.