Agenda item

5.1       The Assistant Director Education delivered a presentation on the national reforms to education outlined in the Government’s ‘Opportunity for all: strong schools with great teachers for your child’ White Paper, and how East Sussex County Council was responding to the reforms with partners in the local education system. The Assistant Director covered in the presentation:

·         The national ambitions that the White Paper was working to achieve were very ambitious. By way of an example, the White Paper set an ambition that by 2030, 90% of pupils at the end of primary school would meet the expected standard in reading, writing and maths combined at Key Stage 2. Early data for this academic year indicated just under 55% of pupils were achieving this ambition locally, and just under 59% nationally. Similarly, the White Paper set an ambition for a fully trust-led schools system, with all schools part of, or with plans to join, a Multi-Academy Trust (MAT) by 2030. The gap between the current situation and the Government’s ambition in East Sussex was explained; while nearly all special schools were academies, approximately two thirds of secondary schools were academies and approximately only one quarter of primary schools were academies (with 104 maintained primary schools).

·         The newly clarified role of local authorities in the education system as local authorities step away from maintaining schools. Local authorities would have responsibility for: ensuring sufficiency of school places, school admissions, a strengthened safeguarding role and attendance. ESCC welcomed the clarified role of local authorities in championing the needs and interests of children, particularly the most vulnerable, to ensure they secure good educational outcomes.

·         With regards to the local authority role in attendance, the Department for Education (DfE) had published another document ‘Working together to improve attendance’ which set out the responsibilities of all education system partners in ensuring good attendance in schools. The guidance would come into effect from September 2022, with an expectation the proposals would be fully implemented from September 2023. The Assistant Director noted that school attendance had been a challenging area for East Sussex for some time and was a heightened issue nationally, and locally, following the pandemic. The new attendance guidance set out new expectations for local authorities to know where children were, remove barriers to attendance and particularly focus on early help for families to remove barriers to attendance.

·         The local response to the White Paper, which had involved ESCC articulating its understanding of the reforms and roles the Council would play in the education system in future. These roles were acting as an ambassador for children and young people, especially the most vulnerable; facilitating partnerships with and between schools to support inclusion and improvement; and shaping wider capacity in the system, including having strategic conversations with local and national MATs to ensure there was capacity for every school to be part of a strong family of schools in future.

·         The work that had taken place in response to, and areas that remained uncertain regarding, Government’s policy for a fully trust-led schools system. East Sussex had been identified as an Education Investment Area (EIA) (and Hastings was a priority EIA, as a successor to the Hastings Opportunity Area), which gave the county access to some schemes such as a levelling up funding premium for teachers in subject areas that were challenging to recruit to. EIAs were also prioritised for implementation of the plan for a fully trust-led schools system. DfE therefore expected to work with ESCC, the Regional Schools Commissioner and Dioceses to create a ‘commissioning plan’ covering how schools in East Sussex would move into MATs. The Assistant Director noted options for Diocesan schools would be a key question in this work, given the number of Diocese primary schools in East Sussex. The Children’s Services Department had started a ‘big conversation’ to hear the views of schools, trusts and the Dioceses as this work progressed.

·         The principles that had been agreed with school leaders to guide the system through discussions over the coming months. In terms of the proposal in the White Paper for local authorities to establish MATs, ESCC was not currently minded to pursue this role and would instead focus on its role in the education system as honest broker and champion of children.

A copy of the presentation that was delivered was included in the meeting agenda.

5.2       The Chair thanked the Assistant Director for the presentation and the Committee asked a number of questions, which covered:

·         Presentation clarifications – the Committee asked what the new ‘arms-length curriculum body’ mentioned in Chapter Two of the White Paper referred to. The Assistant Director clarified that this was referring to further development of the Oak Academy Trust which was a national resource developed during the pandemic to support schools with providing a digital curriculum and digital resources. The Committee also asked for more information about what resource would be devolved to Area Groups and/or Education Improvement Partnerships as part of ESCC’s work to facilitate strong partnerships with and between schools, referenced on slide twelve of the presentation. The Assistant Director clarified that this work would involve looking at how existing resource could be deployed differently or more effectively through those groups. For example, the Department was currently undertaking work looking at how Secondary Area Groups used alternative provision to reduce exclusions. The Assistant Director confirmed that no additional resource had been allocated nationally to deliver the reforms. The Committee also sought confirmation that the Department would work with both the Church of England Diocese and Roman Catholic Diocese on the reforms in the coming months, which the Director of Children’s Services confirmed.

·         School attendance and use of fines – the Committee asked at what point the Department would consider use of fines in response to poor school attendance, given the potential that doing so could lead, in extreme and rare circumstances, to imprisonment. The Assistant Director responded that use of fines were an important aspect of the Council’s response on attendance but would not be the Department’s first response. The Assistant Director committed to provide the Committee with further detail on at what stage, and for what reasons, the Department would pursue fines and noted that the new attendance guidance mentioned in the presentation included sections on legal intervention and the powers local authorities could use. The Director of Children’s Services added that the Department worked very hard to support parents to improve attendance and avoid the use of fines, but parents had a duty to ensure their children were in education (be that in a school or through Elective Home Education) and that fines and sanctions were an important part of ESCC being able to robustly exercise its role in ensuring children were receiving the quality of education they had a right to. The Lead Member for Education and ISEND reinforced this and welcomed plans in the Schools Bill to provide councils with more powers to understand when children were being home educated.

·         Lengthened school week - the Committee asked whether plans for a richer, longer average school week to ensure children enjoyed a rounded education, which were set out in the White Paper, were intended to improve extra curricula activities for children. The Committee also asked what impact the lengthened school week was expected to have on teachers and pay pressures, and the views of the teaching unions on the proposals. The Assistant Director responded that the commitment in the White Paper was for every school to deliver a minimum of 32.5 hours of schooling and as most schools already delivered this, it was not expected to result in a change for the majority of schools, so it was not a concern that had been raised by teachers. The reference to a rounded education was believed to relate to plans for improved physical education and music curricula. 

·         Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) Support and inclusion – the Committee sought assurance that it would be possible to ensure the new MAT system was inclusive and met the needs of all children, including those with SEND. The Assistant Director responded that part of the White Paper was working to clarify standards and expectations of strong MATs, particularly with regards to inclusion. There was a clear expectation in DfE policy that all schools would be inclusive and meet the needs of all children and this particularly came through in the recent Green Paper on reforms to the SEND system. The Assistant Director offered to discuss how the Green Paper reforms would support inclusion in all schools in more detail with members of the Committee at another time if helpful.

·         Impact of academisation policy on the local authority – the Committee asked for further information on the anticipated timeline for migration of all schools to MATs and what the impact of the migration was expected to be on local authority services. The Assistant Director responded that the implementation timeline was very challenging and the Council had limited control over the pace at which it was delivered. The Council was therefore working hard to have an open dialogue with schools to understand their plans and intentions to ensure this was well-supported. The Director noted that the DfE acknowledged that local authorities did not have the capacity to support academisation at the rate the DfE would like, and knew this presented a challenge.

In terms of services, the Director explained that the Council already sold services (such as finance, HR, payroll, educational psychology and English as an Additional Language) to academies successfully and would look to continue this by ensuring that our service offers remained viable, strong and attractive to academies. Officers were considering the impact of academisation and how the service offer could be maintained for all schools longer-term, including once they became academies. The Committee asked a follow-up question to confirm it had been understood correctly that the Council did not have concerns about loss of traded service income because the Authority expected to be able to maintain viable income from schools regardless of whether they were maintained schools or academies. The Director confirmed that the intention was to continue delivering services to schools through the period of transition to MATs, and that the Department was largely confident, based on income already received from academies, that this was possible, but the viability of all services was kept under close review.

·         Education Investment Area status – the Committee welcomed the recognition of Hastings as a priority EIA and asked if the county had EIA status because of challenges with educational attainment in Hastings. The Director and Lead Member for Education and ISEND confirmed EIA status was due to both challenges with attainment in Hastings and in other part of the county.

·         MAT performance – the Committee asked for further information on the difference in performance between schools in MATs and local authority maintained schools. The Assistant Director responded that the difference in performance was a mixed picture nationally. In East Sussex, it was really challenging to analyse whether performance was linked to school status as many other factors had to be taken into account, including previous school performance, location, deprivation and proportion of children with SEND. The Director and Lead Member noted that many of the schools with challenges with attainment in the county were academies so academisation alone did not necessarily improve educational outcomes.

·         Alternative Provision – the Committee asked for further information on what the plans for full academisation meant for alternative provision. The Assistant Director responded that alternative provision in East Sussex was delivered by College Central as part of the Sabden MAT. The Department was, as part of its work to reduce exclusions, reviewing this alternative provision offer to ensure there was a good offer for children in all parts of the county and that the offer was focussed on shorter interventions and supporting children back into mainstream school wherever possible.

·         Plans for Local Authority Established Trusts – the Committee asked for further information on the Council’s position with regards to establishing Local Authority Established Trusts. The Director responded that the Department had not ruled this option out and it would continue to be considered by the Department as the policy was rolled out nationally. The starting position of the Department, however, was that it was very important that the Council could exercise its challenge role on inclusion for all schools and all MATs and that it was seen to be doing this impartially. The Director felt that initially seeking to have strong non-local authority-established MATs operating in the county left ESCC with a very clear, impartial role on challenge and advocating for children. At the same time, the Department would not rule out establishing a Trust on principle if it was clear this would be the best and fastest way to improve educational outcomes for children.

5.3       The Committee RESOLVED to request another update on progress with implementing the White Paper reforms in a year.