Academies Bill [HL]

My Lords, my Amendment 179 is also in this group of amendments. As the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, has mentioned, probably a number of us were sent them and we have used them in differing ways, but they are in fact extremely similar. My proposal is very much, as we argued in the first place, that if you have to go through a series of consultations before you take the specific step of applying properly to become an academy, the whole procedure of consulting the parents, the staff and everyone—the kitchen sink, as it were—to become an academy is the same as the procedure before you decide to come out of the process. All of that indicates the concern about the whole process. There are without doubt, as originally set out, a number of reasons why a school, having suddenly leapt to the idea that becoming an academy is definitely the way forward, might regret converting to one, so it should have the option of returning to maintained status if that is best for the education of its children. I therefore join other noble Lords in what they have said about these amendments, and I hope the Minister will be able to satisfy us on these points.