Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help academy schools under financial pressures handle the potential loss of experienced staff; and what support her Department offers staff facing possible redundancy.

The department supports academy trusts to have the capability to manage their resources effectively by providing high-quality advice, support and development to help schools protect against financial difficulty. Where academy trusts are experiencing significant financial difficulty, the department engages supportively to provide practical advice and guidance.

A key element of the department's support are School Resource Management Advisers (SRMAs), practising sector experts such as school business professionals that work collaboratively with schools and trusts. SRMAs provide independent, expert and tailored advice to trusts on how they should make best use of their resources to deliver the best possible educational outcomes for their pupils. This support is for the whole sector and SRMAs have completed more than 2,000 visits to schools, trusts and local authorities, with 92% of survey respondents rating their experience of an SRMA as good or very good.

High-quality teaching is the factor that makes the biggest difference to a child’s education. This is why we will recruit 6,500 new expert teachers. We will get more teachers into shortage subjects, support areas that face recruitment challenges, and tackle retention issues. There are now 468,693 full-time equivalent teachers in state-funded schools in England. The department’s initiatives are aimed not only at increasing teacher recruitment in key subjects and areas, but also at ensuring teachers stay and thrive in the profession.