Academy chief, in line to be England’s new chief inspector, leads trust which has suspended more pupils than any other

The academy chief executive who has been reported to be in pole position to become England’s next chief inspector of schools leads a trust with the highest number of suspended pupils on record, fresh analysis by Education Uncovered has revealed.

Sir Martyn Oliver, chief executive of Outwood Grange Academies Trust, was reported over the weekend to be the preferred choice of Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, for the post.

However, a trawl of official government exclusions data shows that the 40-school Outwood Grange trust (OGAT), based in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, is way ahead of any other in the country when it comes to the number of pupils ever to have been handed temporary exclusions.

Meanwhile, Education Uncovered has learnt that Sir Martyn told staff at the trust on Monday that he had “heard nothing” from the government about the new role, and so did not know if he was to be His Majesty’s Chief Inspector or not.

The detail

The DfE’s annualised database of exclusions statistics currently covers a 14-year period, from 2006-7 to 2020-21. This encapsulates the entire history of the multi-academy trust structure operating at scale, in the period up to the academic year before last.