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10 April 2026

Author: Simon Kay

ESFA investigates finances of Trinity Academy London Trust

The government is investigating alleged financial irregularities at an academy trust in south London that was issued a redacted finance warning notice earlier this year. A financial notice from March, published last Friday, ordered the Trinity Academy London Trust – which ran the Trinity Academy in Brixton – to hand over full minutes and notes […]

DfE relaunch forces policy experts to reapply for posts

The Department for Education is “refreshing” its team of experts who inform policy-making – just 18 months after recruiting them. The department started recruiting 200 “external experts” two years ago under a £10 million contract that was labelled at the time as a “waste of public money”. About 100 experts have been recruited. But the […]

Covid advisory group signed gagging orders, DfE reveals

Twelve members of a group advising the Department for Education on its Covid-19 response have signed gagging orders. Schools Week revealed in May that the recovery advisory group, made up of academy leaders, charity bosses and others, had been formed to help the department. It has now emerged that the group members signed personal confidentiality […]

Senior staff ‘ignored our Covid fears’, say striking teachers

Teachers at a Wirral primary school are set to go on strike after claiming that senior staff repeatedly ignored health and safety concerns surrounding Covid-19. Staff at Kingsway Primary School will walk out for six days across December and January in what is believed to be the first school industrial action linked to the virus. […]

Council with rising home education rapped for potential off-rolling

Ofsted has rapped a council after discovering potential off-rolling of children in care, with the number of pupils educated at home shooting up more than 20 per cent. The watchdog does not name the schools and will only report on the alleged practices if they continue once full inspections resume in the summer term. Ofsted’s […]

Trust embroiled in £2m contract legal row amid move to the cloud

England’s largest academy trust is entangled in a High Court legal dispute with a major software supplier that lost out on a £2 million contract to move the trust to a cloud-based data system.  Bromcom Computers claims United Learning breached procurement law by awarding rival Arbor a five-year contract to provide its management information system […]

New report calls for dedicated ‘Office for Edtech’ to drive change

A dedicated Office for EdTech and Digital Skills should be established “at the heart of government” to drive “coherent national change”, a new report has recommended.  The Edtech Advisory Forum, made up of school leaders and tech specialists, has released an interim report investigating the impact of Covid-19 on education and children’s services.  The report, […]

£96m laptop contracts went to Tory donor’s firm

A firm handed almost £100 million worth of contracts to supply laptops to disadvantaged children without an open tender was founded by a Tory donor.  Computacenter Ltd was chosen by the Department for Education to deliver 230,000 laptops to vulnerable pupils after the Covid school lockdowns. Private Eye revealed this week that the firm’s founder, […]