Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Gibb and Ronnie Campbell

Monday 27th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gibb]

What parents want is every local school to be a good school, and that is what the academies programme is delivering. Sponsored schools that have been open for four years are showing a 5.7 percentage point improvement in their GCSE results compared with their predecessor schools, so it is a programme that is working. I am afraid that in the past too many schools were left languishing under local authority control.

[Mr Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) (Lab)]

15. What assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the system of academy sponsorship; and if she will make a statement.

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)]

There are 642 approved academy sponsors, and 349 of them are good or outstanding converter academies. Results over a number of years show that established sponsors are delivering sustained improvements, helping to transform the life chances of thousands of pupils. There is a rigorous and thorough process for approving sponsors and reviewing their growth and performance, and regional schools commissioners now lead in identifying new sponsors, challenging existing sponsors and advising on appropriate sponsor matches for new academies.

[Mr Campbell]

The Secretary of State indicated some time ago that she was in favour of allowing Ofsted to check on academy schools. Why has she changed her mind? Or is the Chief Whip still in charge of her Department?

[Mr Gibb]

Of course, Ofsted does inspect academies and does have the power to inspect chains of academies, as we have seen recently with its inspections of a series of academies in the E-ACT and Academies Enterprise Trust chains. The truth is that Ofsted has the power to inspect chains of academy schools.