Academies: Gender Pay Gap

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Wednesday 25th April 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Agnew of Oulton]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Storey, is correct that academy pay is set by the trusts themselves. However, we have taken action on high-end pay. One of the first things I did when I took on this job in September was to ask officials to write to 29 single-academy trusts where there was high pay. Since then, we have resolved that 16 of them no longer pay the levels that were indicated in their returns. We have now also written to a number of multiacademy trusts, and in the last couple of weeks we have written to all trusts which pay more than £100,000 or which have more than two people in their trust who are paid more than £100,000. So we are alert to it, I am bearing down on it where we see excesses, and I will continue to do so.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, we have known for some time that senior pay in multiacademy trusts is out of control. Now we have evidence that, as the noble Lord, Lord Storey, said, women working in academy chains suffer some of the worst gender pay gaps. Is this not public funding, which is being used to entrench inequality in the education system? I have to say that the Minister is personally associated with this issue. The website for the Inspiration Trust, which runs 14 academies in East Anglia, lists him as a trustee and a person with significant control. Noble Lords may wonder why, seven months after being appointed as an Education Minister, he is allowed to continue to hold those posts. But for now, can the Minister say that, despite the fact that trusts have the right to set their own salaries, the size of those gender pay gaps is a scandal, and are he and his department prepared to give advice to trusts to begin to close those gaps?

[Lord Agnew of Oulton]

My Lords, perhaps I should address the Inspiration Trust first, as I was indeed its founder. The chief executive took on 14 schools, seven of which were in special measures when we took them on. All are now out of special measures. Thousands of children are getting a better education than they were five years ago, and that is the essence of what autonomy of pay is all about. Where we have excess pay and there is poor performance, as I said to the noble Lord, Lord Storey, I am bearing down on that. No one is more messianic about the misallocation of taxpayers’ money, but we need to strike a balance between autonomy, where good teachers and good leaders are given the chance to develop and improve schools, and those who are not good are held to account.