Kings Science Academy (Bradford)

Gerry Sutcliffe Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mr Ward]

We need clear evidence, because we are now receiving at best evasive responses to the questions that many of us have been asking. At worst, hiding behind the ongoing police inquiry, we have received no response whatever. To be honest, the evasiveness of some of the responses has been disrespectful to Members of this House. We need answers—all the speculation can then disappear.

We know how serious things were in the school, and that the audit reports identify not only the fraud, but all the nepotism and other financial irregularities that were taking place. I repeat that all of that was known by the DFE, but no action was taken at all. We are not talking about a young and inexperienced man, but about a dishonest and disreputable character, and yet, with all that information, the DFE was content to let the principal remain in place.

I hope that the Minister can prove me wrong, because I have a number of serious allegations about the DFE itself. If I am right, the independence of the civil service must be in doubt. Will the Minister please put to bed some of the suspicion about the DFE by helping us? The Department has failed in its public duty to expose what it knew to be malpractice and criminal activity—it held information back and covered up the situation. We cannot have the freedom extended to free schools including freedom from public accountability.

On the reporting of an admitted crime to the police, I am still not satisfied. We have asked oodles of questions, but I am still not satisfied that the DFE acted as it should have. There will always be suspicion of a cover-up until the Minister carries out a full investigation into what happened.

The first phase of the launch of the Kings school was praised by the Prime Minister and described in the press as closest to David Cameron’s vision of what a free school should be. We know the background, but when the whole scandal broke, the DFE said that it was for the school itself to decide whether the issue was a disciplinary one. How on earth can an organisation highlighted in an audit report as responsible be the organisation responsible for looking at itself and dealing with its own disciplinary issues? It beggars belief. A Government audit uncovers misconduct so serious that it needs to be passed to the police for criminal investigation, and yet the DFE feels that it is for the school itself to decide whether the issue is a disciplinary one.

When at last the Department decided that matters could not be contained within the school, it finally referred it to Action Fraud. We are asked to believe that Action Fraud botched up the recording of the fraud on 25 April. Even if we believed that to be true, we know that the DFE then did nothing about ensuring that a crime was investigated until 5 September, when it sent an exploratory e-mail to ask what was going on.

On 5 September, the DFE knew that its April report had been erroneously recorded as an information report. It was told by Action Fraud:

“If more information related to your report becomes available your report will be re-assessed to determine its viability for investigation.”

The Department knew that on 5 September, but did nothing. Why was the audit report not sent directly to the police at that time?

[Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for the work he has been doing on this case, which has affected the credibility of some of the free schools in Bradford—notwithstanding the fact that there are some good ones. We had to get the information about when the police were informed from the police themselves, not from the DFE. We were asking questions, either written questions or questions on the Floor of the House, to try to get answers, yet answers we got none—except when we contacted the police.

[Mr Ward]

When we asked the police in e-mails what they had received, they said that they had received nothing. Despite what the DFE said, they did not receive the reports.

As for the questions we have been asking, there are simply too many discrepancies between the answers to parliamentary questions and the other evidence available to us. The Department made its original report on 25 April 2013: that is when the matter was reported—so we are told—to Action Fraud. Let us not forget that that is eight months after the CCW report. If the DFE had seen that report at that point, why was it not made public?