ALL SCHOOLS will be academies under a Labour government, the party’s education spokesman, Stephen Twigg said yesterday.
Academies, which are privately-run but state-funded, operate outside of local authority control, set their own curriculum and decide their own school terms and the length of school days.
They set their own pay and conditions terms of teachers and other workers they employ, breaking national agreements with trade unions.
Shadow Education Secretary Twigg said he wants all state schools in England to have the ‘independence’ given to academies and that he wants to end a ‘fragmented, divisive’ school system.
Twigg said ‘free schools’, set up by parents and other groups, would no longer be created under Labour, but would not be shut down.
The more than 80 free schools already open and those in the pipeline would continue to be funded, said Twigg, but beyond that point new schools would have to be created as academies.
Speaking like a Tory, Twigg told his audience at the RSA in London: ‘We know that giving schools more freedom over how they teach and how they run and organise their schools can help to raise standards.
‘So why should we deny those freedoms to thousands of schools? All schools should have them, not just academies and free schools.
‘A school should not have to change its structure just to gain freedoms.’
Since Labour left office in 2010, more than half of secondary schools, as well as many primary schools,have become academies and there are now nearly 3,000.
Twigg said that ‘rather than turn back from the model of school autonomy,’ a Labour government would ‘accelerate more schools in that direction.’
Twigg also said former education secretary, David Blunkett, would head a review into how academies and other schools should work with local authorities.
In response to Twigg’s speech, the leaderships of the teachers unions covered up for the Labour Party’s further lurch to the right, with the NUT inferring that he pledged to end the power of academies to set employee pay and conditions, which is not the case.
Christine Blower, General Secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: ‘The Union is pleased to welcome Stephen Twigg’s announcement today that Labour Party policy will require all schools to employ qualified teachers and that there will be a national system for pay and conditions.’
Chris Keates, General Secretary of the NASUWT, said: ‘The focus on standards not structures is a welcome and refreshing change from the position of the Coalition Government.’
Dr Mary Bousted, the general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL), said: ‘The lack of accountability in academies and free schools must be over-turned, so we welcome the chance to reinstate local authorities’ responsibilities for all schools in their area.
Tom Davies, President of Ealing NUT, condemned moves towards changing the union’s policy of opposition to academies.
He told News Line: ‘The nut position is very much against Gove’s drive to force through academies and have unqualified teachers, whether from the services or wherever. ‘However, that is by no means the only reason we are opposed to academies.
‘Academies are able to set their own terms and conditinos and refuse to recognise trade unions.
‘We have to reinforce the NUT position which has always been to oppose academies.’
