NASUWT: For schools, it's better the devil you know

Wednesday, 17 November 2010 12:00 AM

Chris Keates, general secretary of NASUWT, comments on Michael Gove's proposals to expand the academies programme:

"There is nothing new in this announcement.

"Since the Academies Act went through parliament all schools have been eligible to apply.

"However, no-one has been killed in a rush for schools to convert.

"Only a handful of schools became academies. Most of them cited their reason for doing so as more funding.

"The savage cuts to school funding announced in the comprehensive spending review and the recent news that the coalition government intends to introduce a single national funding formula for all schools have now put paid to any idea that schools will gain financially by becoming academies.

"Wise schools leaders and governing bodies recognise that in these uncertain times it would be foolish to take the profound and irreversible decision to sever any link with a local authority and put their schools at the mercy of a remote, national, democratically unaccountable funding quango.

"It really is a case of better the devil you know."

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