Local authorities to be given power to force thousands of community schools into academy status, new schools bill suggests

Local authorities are to be given the power to force schools they oversee into academy status –if a schools bill published by the government today becomes law.

The bill includes new clauses which would, for the first time, allow councils to apply directly to the government for academy status for any of “their” schools, subject to consultation with their governing bodies but, in respect of most local authority schools, not needing their permission to do so.

My reading of the newly-published bill suggests, too, that there would no requirement to consult with communities, where a local authority applies to the Department for Education for academy status for a school.

The detail

There have been reports about local authorities having new powers to set up academy trusts in recent months, with the white paper including passages about this. But there has been some mystery about how this would work.

The new bill looks to set out the detail, with councils simply allowed to apply to convert any of “its” schools.