Bullying academy brokers spotlight falls on Jacky Griffin

Fiona Millar has written about the so-called academy brokers on the Local Schools Network site. A particular focus is Jacky Griffin, who was Director of Education for Brent before moving on to Kensington and Chelsea where she was restructured out of a job.  Her brokering work at Gladstone Park Primary has led to allegations of bullying:

There has been a lot in the news this week about academies and their funding. As we suspected all along,   DFE  management of thousands of schools has proved inefficient. Money ear-marked for school improvement has been squandered and while the government sprays money around with abandon on its favoured projects, other schools are facing cuts.

One particular story caught my eye. It was in the Telegraph and concerned the academy brokers. These are representatives of the DFE who move in on schools that are allegedly failing and forcibly convert them to academy status. I say representatives because it turns out that  they don’t actually work for the DFE. They are consultants and paid through personal service companies which pay corporation tax rather than income tax.This is in spite of the fact that Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander has said that this practice should be outlawed by government departments.

Recently the Conservative leader of Lancashire County Council complained to the Secretary of State about the activities of these people. So who are they? One name that comes up frequently is that of Jacky Griffin. She featured heavily in the forced conversion of Downhills Primary School and several other governing bodies who are being bullied by the DFE into converting to academy status have mentioned her name to me.

She was also involved in the last Labour government’s moves to encourage academies and trust schools as part of the BSF building programme.

Here is a little bit more information about Ms Griffin, in which she is listed as a consultant at the DFE and a Director of Griffin Taylor Consultancy Ltd. And here is some information about her company’s financial position. As it is an exempt small company, with only two directors, facts are limited but one thing seems clear,the DFE consultancy business is a very comfortable one.

Last year the government did provide some information about the tax arrangements of off payroll consultants and employment agencies. Here is a link . It would appear that the daily rate paid to personal service companies is slightly less than that paid to employment agencies,  but in return the  identities and addresses of the consultants are not provided. Does anyone else know who they might be?

Barratt's Welsh Harp development proposals in stark illustration

The illustrations below show the present West Hendon Estate and Barratt's proposals. The new plans are much higher density and sited closer to the wildfowl reserve.

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Brent Council still fails to support Gladstone Park parents

As you probably know I have had an exchange of letters with Cllr Mary Arnold (Brent Executive lead member for children and families) over education in Brent and my claim that the Labour Council is not standing up for a democratically accountable local school system and in particular backing the Gladstone Park Primary parents in their campaign against becoming a forced academy. (Mary Arnold saw that as me 'attacking Brent Education'.)

James Denselow has posted this defence from Mary on his blog:

What is Brent Labour doing in response to Gove’s agenda?

Answer from Cllr. Mary Arnold – Lead Member for Children and Families:

We are primarily campaigning with London Councils tackling  Gove on free schools  which are unaccountable and in the wrong places, unaccountable academies, cutbacks in the Early Intervention Grant reducing surestart for early years and unfair access to childcare.

In Brent we joined other local authorities in a national campaign to challenge the injustice of moving GCSE grade boundaries so over 100 Brent pupils were downgraded in English, undermining their career chances. Our campaign was covered by the national and local press with lots of my quotes over the period..

My letters to the local press on Gove’s u-turn on the curriculum are published

http://www.brentlabour.co.uk/gove_s_u_turn

and my article on Gove forcing schools in his academisation drive and his shocking dismissal of parents’ views at Gladstone is on the website.

http://www.brentlabour.co.uk/supporting_gladstone_primary

I sent my letter published in Brent and Kilburn Times challenging Martin Francis’ letter attacking Brent Education the previous week to all Labour activists but I think the H and K members are not always included. Lee is therefore including website references in his campaign newsletters

There is more including a H and K education ‘think piece’ I am contributing to. Happy to talk to members and send on campaign articles with more coming up.

Cllr Michael Pavey, (Labour, Barnhill) Chair of Governors at Wembley Primary School is said to be challenging Arnold for her Executive post at next month's AGM. Denselow is challenging Lesley Jones for her position and a good source has said that Cllr Roxanne Mashari (Labour, Welsh Harp) in challenging Cllr James Powney. 

So we can expect some manoeuvring ahead of the votes and a debate is always healthy. However a Brent Council spokesperson in the report below on the Gladstone Park Primary campaign again seems to indicate that Brent Council is willing to do little to fight forced academisation:

A Brent Council spokesman said the authority was working with the headteacher and governors on offering 'programme of support':

The DfE's default position is that a school which fails its Ofsted inspection becomes a sponsored academy and parents are campaigning against this. We understand that governors are still making their case to the secretary of state. It is inappropriate for the council to discuss future options directly with parents' groups. We discuss options with the governing body, which in turn has the role of consulting parents. We're sorry if we didn;t respond in a timely way to explain that.

No condemnation of forced academies policy, no condemnation of DfE bullying, no support for the parents' battle and no expression of confidence in the staff and governors' capacity to improve the school without being forced to become an academy.

I think that's pretty poor.

Kids take over Chalkhill Park

I was greeted by whoops of excitement and shouted greetings as I passed Chalkhill Park at 6.15pm this evening. As you can see the children have taken it over and made it their own.  It is not yet officially open and a pensive child outside whispered, 'You know this is illegal'.  But a parent said, 'How can we tell them they can't go in. They have been waiting for the park for 3 years and here it is now and they just love it!'

A decision will be made tomorrow about a possible earlier opening. There are concerns that the grass sown between the gaps in the safety matting of the children's playground, which is at an early stage of growth, will be damaged but anyone wanting to keep the children out now that they have had a taste of the park  will have quite a job on their hands!

Garth McWilliams who designed the park should be thrilled by the children's reaction.

Chalkhill 'People's Park' may open sooner than expected after direct action

The 'People's Park' today

The recent warm weather has resulted in children and families making use of the new Chalkhill Park despite it not yet being officially open and still surrounded by builders' fencing.

The temptation of green grass and exciting play equipment proved too much of a temptation after three long years of waiting. A bit of low key spontaneous direct action resulted in an unofficial entrance being created.

I recently saw parents sitting chatting while their children played, a teenager doing her homework on a laptop at a picnic bench and young people chilling out. It demonstrated to me how badly the park was needed and how keen people are to get in there and use it.

Today there were 10 labourers working on the park. I checked and was told that the play equipment has received its final safety check and that a decision will be made tomorrow on whether the park should open now with any uncompleted areas being fenced off temporarily,

I think that would be a sensible decision as public use by families would be likely to deter any misuse of the park and why on earth shouldn't it be open if it is largely complete?

The official opening by the new Mayor of Brent will be on Saturday June 8th and plans include special activities, performance, bouncy castles, talent show and much more on the Saturday, outdoor gym equipment training on Sunday and Chalkhill Primary School pupils will take it over for a Carnival procession and other activities on the afternoon of  Monday June 10th.

Local authorities must be allowed to plan and build more community primary schools

This was my response to Boris Johnson's call for educationalists to drop their 'ideological'  opposition to free schools in order to solve the shortage of primary places crisis as reported in the Evening Standard this week. Johnson said, “There’s a lot of prejudice against free schools on the part of the education establishment and they need to lose it and need to build more.There’s a huge demographic crisis looming in London and we need to fund the schools. At the moment we’re worried there’s some kind of ideological foot dragging about free schools. They’ve got to blast ahead and make space."

It is truly shocking that 118,000 children will be without a school place by 2016 and Boris Johnson's solution of 'more free schools' will not answer the problem. Free school provision by its very nature is ad hoc, depending on a group coming forward often with unproven back of the envelope plans (just look at their websites)and there is no guarantee that they will be sited in areas of need.

The Coalition's insistence that any new schools should be academies or free schools means that local authorities cannot carefully plan the construction of new community schools across their borough ensuring that there is equal distribution and access.  The fragmentation of the school system under present government policies alongside the undermining, politically and financially, of local authorities means that LAs have the statutory responsibility to provide a school place for every child but not the powers to do so.

This is forcing them to adopt sticking plaster short-term solutions including bulge classes and expansions of present buildings which result in over-large schools, with in some cases more than 1,000 5-11 year olds in one building, loss of play space and cramped conditions. This worsens the quality of provision of all children order to cater for the additional numbers.

If we put children first, and not Michael Gove's ideology, we will restore a local authority's right to build new community schools with all the quality assurance provided by a properly planned and  funded, democratically accountable, local school system.

Reclaim St George for multicultural Britain - Patrick Vernon

Guest blog by Patrick Vernon, first published in The Voice. Vernon is one of the contenders for Labour's parliamentary candidate for Brent Central.

AS THE BNP, EDL and UKIP party activists, candidates and sympathisers huddle around their campfires to review their misinformed campaign tactics for the upcoming May local elections in England and the European elections in 2014, they will take comfort from their inspiration leader and symbol of Great White Hope: St George.

Yes, folks, St George’s day is upon us again! The far right and certain members of the coalition government will be tooled up with passion in their hearts, renewing their vows against black and minority ethnic people, gay and lesbian community, feminists, trade unionists, socialists and democrats who are destroying the so-called ‘English way of life’.

The English patron saint St George represents medieval tradition and the role of the Crusaders who ‘fought the good fight’ in the advancement of Christianity and morality in an uncivilized and heathen world. In today’s society, Islam, the hip-hop/hoodie generation, refugees, people on benefits and gypsy/traveller communities are seen as the new public enemy where a new moral crusade is required for them to be ‘civilised’.

One of the greatest inspirations of the right and fascists to justify their policies and convictions around immigration and citizenship has been the values and principles around the virtues of the patron saint St George.

Namely that St George represents the genealogy of Englishness and British family history and heritage as a pure race with undiluted bloodlines.

And that St George represents the tradition of fair play, respect, tolerance, diplomacy and values of an England where people lived harmoniously and where multiculturalism and integration was not an issue.
Well, I have news for the BNP, EDL and David Cameron, what they promote is either incorrect or full of contradictions. It was back in 2003 while researching and developing the 100 Great Black Britons campaign and website (www.100greatblackbritons.com) that I found St George or, to give him his correct name, George of Lydda was actually of black and African descent.

Contrary to public opinion, St George never came to England to slay dragons or save princesses but was born in Cappadocia, then in Asia Minor what is now Turkey. He was persecuted and died at the hands of Roman Emperor Diocletian on 23 April, 303 AD in Nicomedia, Bithynia, on the Black Sea.

St George’s life and the lives of other African people during this period of ancient history have not been recorded and documented in a systematic way by European academics. However, black scholars such as J.A. Rogers in the three-volume book called Sex and Race in the 1930s have traced the black presence during the Greek and Roman periods. The impression that is given in public debates and the recent bicentenary slave trade events is that that black people did not exist until the slave trade.

St George and Septimus Severus, another Great Black Briton who was the equivalent of the Prime Minster of his day, and many others played a key influential role during the Roman Empire.

Unlike Septimus Severus, George of Lydda was a successful Roman Tribune who turned his back on the Roman political system and converted to Christianity. His commitment to religion and his subsequent torture led to his iconic status by the Crusaders when they travelled to the Middle East and North Africa. St George was subsequently adopted in the 14th Century in England as our patron saint.

It is 20 years since the murder of Stephen Lawrence and as a society we still have not fully grasped and acknowledged the nature and the impact of instutionalised racism and the legacy of Empire. Michael Gove’s social engineering of the national curriculum and Eric Pickles’ integration strategy reflects an ill-conceived and rose-tinted vision of Britain.

The recent cuts in public services, spate of deaths and mass unemployment of young black men is a major concern which is part of the wider legacy of post-Empire and its impact on social exclusion, inequalities of wealth, class and the status of black and other minority ethnic communities in Britain today.

It is a sad fact of history that victims of institutionalised racism over the years such as Orville Blackwood, Colin Roach, Smiley Culture, Roger Sylvester, Rocky Bennett, Mark Duggan, Sean Rigg and many others reflect the symbolism that St George is really the patron saint of black men, oppressed people and the maturity of our multicultural society.

I hope the BNP/EDL hierarchy and supporters will continue to honour George of Lydda but recognise that they are supporting a black role model.

Over the past 20 years, mainly through sporting achievements such as the Olympics, boxing and representation in national team sports such as football and rugby, there is a growing acceptance and ownership of St George being adopted by black and minority ethnic communities.

I also hope the 2015 General election will focus on celebrating and focusing on the achievements, benefits and opportunities around immigration and migration.

So let’s continue to reclaim St George’s day and make it symbol of our multicultural society and a rallying cry in the fight against racism and fascism.

Major concerns on academy funding and oversight raised by Public Accounts Committee

 We are sceptical that the department has sufficient resources to properly 

oversee the expanding programme

The BBC reported yesterday that the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee has issued a critical report on academies financing:

Committee chairman Margaret Hodge said inefficient funding systems and poor cost control had driven up the cost of the programme.

"Of the £8.3 billion spent on academies from April 2010 to March 2012, some £1 billion was an additional cost which had to be met by diverting money from other departmental budgets.
"Some of this money had previously been earmarked to support schools struggling with difficult challenges and circumstances. £350 million of the extra £1 billion represented extra expenditure that was never recovered from local authorities."

Part of the overspend will be due to the increase from about 200 open academies in April 2010 to more than 2,886 in March 2012.

But the committee warns the "oversight of academies has had to play catch-up with the rapid growth in academy numbers", and heard concerns of money being allocated twice in some cases.

The report also notes that much of the extra costs of the programme were met out of existing budgets - most notably £95m from a fund previously earmarked for improving underperforming schools.

But it warns that because so many converters were high-performing schools, those that might have needed the extra financial help more had arguably lost out.

The report also warns that the present system makes it hard for the department to prove academies are not receiving more money than they should. Ministers are still unable to convince those interested that academies do not get more money than regular schools.

It says central government may be "too distant to oversee individual academies effectively", and suggests that things will get tougher as the programme expands further in the future.

"We are sceptical that the department has sufficient resources to properly oversee the expanding programme, especially as schools now joining are less high-performing and may require greater oversight and scrutiny."
It notes that the number of central staff overseeing academies' finance and assurance has doubled since May 2010, while the number of academies has increased tenfold.

It points to some "serious cases of governance failure and financial impropriety in academies" that went undetected by the department's own monitoring.

It warns that oversight systems have not kept pace with academy numbers and expresses concern that only now - more than two years into the expansion programme - has the department started to address value-for-money issues.
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The committee also says there is too little public information about finances at individual academy level.

It calls on the department to publish school level expenditure, including per-pupil funding, for academies and to subject them to the same level of public scrutiny as experienced by regular state schools.