Bridget Phillipson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Bridget Phillipson on 2016-10-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she plans to bring forward legislation to allow for the forcible conversion of schools to academy status in underperforming local authority areas.

Edward Timpson

We have been clear that we want to see all schools, over time, become academies. But our focus is on schools where standards need to be raised. So we will continue to convert all schools that are judged inadequate by Ofsted, and work with those that are coasting or otherwise underperforming to identify the support they need to improve. We expect that in some cases this support will be through conversion to become a sponsored academy. No new legislation is required for these purposes.