Investigation: how does a largely taxpayer-funded teacher education body get to spend �5.5m on new London headquarters?

Ark's address at 65, Kingsway, central London, also home related charities

How does an organisation, mainly funded by the taxpayer to run continuing professional development courses for teachers, manage to loan another connected charity £5.5 million for “office space” in West London?

This intriguing question has arisen as recent accounts of a charity called Ambition School Leadership – now renamed the Ambition Institute – and its closely-related organisation Absolute Return for Kids (Ark) document what is stated as a loan from the former to the latter.

With Ambition School Leadership and its predecessor organisations having existed predominantly on the funding they have received through a series of contracts to run leadership training for teachers, it seems worth asking this question.

So I’ve had a dive into these organisations’ accounts.