DfE handed �38 million in loans to academy trusts, including �5m to now-stricken chain, FOI data reveal

An academy trust which collapsed last year had been loaned at least �5.2 million by the Department for Education, a freedom of information response has revealed.

Schools Company Trust owed £5.18m to the government as of a year ago, the disclosure shows, although it remains unclear as to how or whether the money will be returned.

Schools Company was one of 82 trusts which, as of March 2018, had outstanding, low-interest loans owing to the government’s Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), the disclosure shows, with the total cost of these loans standing at £37.7 million.

Three of the seven chains with the largest amounts owed had chief executives paid more than £200,000 in 2017-18, their latest accounts show.

Other examples of DfE deficit funding provided to academy trusts included:

• £2.5 million going to England’s second-largest chain, the Academies Enterprise Trust.
• £1.8m going to an organisation with only three schools: Shrewsbury Academies Trust (its accounts show that this figure had ballooned by August 2018 to £2.7m).
• A single academy trust, Theale Green, now closed, had run up a deficit to the government of £1.2m.
• A £617,500 loan going to one of England’s most successful academy trusts, the Harris Federation, which had 11 people earning at least £150,000 in 2017-18, and a CEO on approaching £500k in pay and pensions.
• £53,333 being owed by another collapsed organisation: Bright Tribe.