Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government how the pay and conditions of multi-academy trust staff are monitored.

Academy trusts are free to set their own salaries for staff, and we would expect this to reflect the size and complexity of the trust.

The 2017 Academies Financial Handbook, copy attached, emphasises that decisions about levels of executive pay must follow a robust evidence-based process and are reflective of the individual’s role and responsibilities.

Trusts must disclose senior staff pay annually in their audited accounts. Disclosure must include:

• the number of employees earning more than £60,000, set out in £10,000 bands; and
• names of all staff who are also trustees and the remuneration they received. For a multi-academy trust this is likely to include the chief executive’s salary, unless in the exceptional case that they have chosen not to be a trustee.

A list of academy trusts paying staff more than £150,000 will be included in the 2015/16 Academy Sector Annual Report and Accounts (SARA), which is due to be published in October 2017.