It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce), and a particular pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting), who I think kicked this sorry excuse of a Bill into next week.
I congratulate the hon. Members for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan) and for Kingston and Surbiton (James Berry) on their maiden speeches today. It’s a lovely feeling when you’ve nailed it—I know what it’s like.
I come to this debate as a governor of Thorpe St Andrew school—an outstanding local authority school; I am very proud of it. I will direct my contribution to the education component of the Bill, starting with what I believe is one of its overarching aims, namely, to build on the work of the Education Act 2011. If that Act could be described as the ignition of an engine to drive the dismantling of our public education system, this Bill is intended to turbocharge it—as the PM might say, “Fire up the Quattro, Nicky!”
In my constituency of Norwich South, the vultures are not just circling in anticipation of the Bill’s passage; they are already hacking away at the juiciest cuts. The Inspiration Trust has its beady eye on the Hewett local authority school and the £60 million of land that it sits on—land that belongs to the people of my city, not to what is little more than a corporation masquerading as a so-called educational charity. A secretive, unaccountable corporation in all but name, it has links to the very heart of this Government in the form of Theodore Agnew—a Conservative party donor and non-executive board member initially at the Department for Education, but now at the Ministry of Justice. I am sure that irony has not been missed by the parents and pupils of Hewett, who have seen little in the way of justice when it comes to having a say in their school’s future. That situation will be faced by many more communities if the Bill is passed in its current form.
In saying that, I recognise that there are good and decent academy chains out there, such as the academies run by the Co-operative Academies Trust, which are genuinely accountable and act in the public interest to improve the education of our children. Alas, the Inspiration Trust is not one of them. The Bill worsens rather than improves the chances of holding it to account.