Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to support and improve stuck schools; and what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the January 2020 Ofsted report, Fight or flights? How stuck schools are overcoming isolation.

The Department is committed to tackling entrenched underperformance in schools wherever it exists. For inadequate maintained schools, this includes becoming an academy to benefit from the support of a strong sponsor; or for inadequate academies, transferring them to a stronger academy trust if necessary.

In addition, last September, following confirmation of the biggest funding boost for schools in a decade, totaling an additional £14 billion over three years, the Department announced that we will provide more support to “stuck” schools from high-performing, experienced school leaders, and these mechanisms are now being put in place.

We also confirmed that we would work with Ofsted so that it can provide more detailed analysis on areas for improvement for these schools. We have been doing so and will be confirming details in due course. This announcement can be found at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/new-drive-to-continue-boosting-standards-in-schools.