Weak response from board about its chair’s twitter activity seems to underline the institutionalised remoteness of Ark Schools’ governance from the schools it runs

Sir Paul Marshall. Photo: Alamy.

How could someone with responsibility for setting the strategic direction of state-funded schools educating thousands of children have endorsed a string of what appear to be far-right tweets?

This will be a question asked by a fair few in education, after the organisation Hope not hate, working with the podcast the News Agents, published a story about the Twitter/X account of Sir Paul Marshall, chair of the academy chain Ark Schools.

Hope not hate’s story drew attention to tweets which had either been “liked” or retweeted/reposted by an account called @areopagus123. This was reported in the piece to be Sir Paul’s account, whose name he had changed in September 2023, at the same time as making its contents “protected”. The latter meant that only those already following him could view his activity, and that he could choose whether to accept any new followers*.

Some 11 tweets were included in the article. One, liked by Sir Paul this month, had responded to a tweet saying: “London Mayor Sadiq Khan: ‘Islam celebrates diversity. Diversity is our strength! What do you think?” In response, this post had said: “He’s just taking the piss at this point….The Muslim block vote that keeps [Sadiq Khan] in power will vote Labour until they can vote Muslim. Then the Labour Party will shrivel up and die, and he will switch parties.”