Education Secretary agrees to review academies funding transfer

Education Secretary Michael Gove has said he will rethink the funding of academy schools after 23 councils initiated legal action.

The councils objected to him wanting to strip them of money that had been used to fund services provided to schools such as educational psychology and support for children with special educational needs.

Gove argued this should be removed and given to academies, since they would not necessarily choose to buy these services from a local authority.

It would have taken £148m this year from councils and £265m next.

Councils would have been affected no matter how many academies were in their area, leading to charges of unfairness.

The Education Secretary told the BBC that he would now revisit the issue.

A Department for Education spokesman said: “The academies programme has been so successful that one in six schools are now academies, and they are no longer funded via the local authority.

“It is important to ensure that the taxpayer is not paying twice for the same services. We are in correspondence with local authorities about concerns some of them have raised.

“Local authorities should not be funded for schools that now receive their money direct from central Government and buy their own services.”

Shadow Education Secretary Andy Burnham said: “This is the third time in a year that Michael Gove has had to U-turn under the threat of legal action.

“And the reason that it keeps happening is that he is railroading his policies through without proper consultation, without listening to parents, to teachers, to local councillors.”