Opinion: Legal

Legal: What changes to pay and conditions mean for academies

Employment solicitor, Heather Mitchell looks at how provisions in the schools bill could affect the academy sector

Employment solicitor, Heather Mitchell looks at how provisions in the schools bill could affect the academy sector

5 Feb 2025, 12:30

The children’s wellbeing and schools bill proposes potentially significant changes to teachers’ pay and conditions through the introduction of a unified pay and conditions framework for all state-funded schools, including academies.

Presently, academy trusts have freedom to depart from the school teachers’ pay and conditions document (STPCD), which applies to maintained schools in England.

In theory, this means they can make tweaks to pensions and other benefits in order to adjust pay scales as part of their recruitment and retention efforts.

In practice, however, the majority have not done so. This freedom has been fettered considerably by the requirement to comply with protections for terms and conditions upon transfer of undertakings (protection of employment) legisaltion, and owing to pressure exerted by the trade unions.

The government’s proposal in the bill would make STPCD compliance mandatory for all state-funded schools, including academy trusts.

At the same time, it intends to extend the remit of the school teachers’ review body (STRB) to include academies, with academy trust representatives becoming consultees in the annual national pay review process.

Whether this places academies in a better or worse position when it comes to exercising freedom in teachers’ pay and conditions depends on how they engage with the opportunities that could be on the horizon.

Why are these changes important?

The STPCD sets out a common framework for a number of teachers’ terms and conditions, including:

  • Providing a statutory pay range for teachers, including leadership and unqualified teachers, and allowances for teaching and learning responsibility (TLR) and special educational needs (SEN)
  • Imposing salary safeguarding protections in the event of restructures or significant changes
  • Mandating that teachers’ directed time may not exceed 1,265 hours per academic year and must fall within 195 days
  • Guaranteeing teachers at least 10 per cent of their timetabled teaching time as planning, preparation and assessment (PPA) time
  • Preventing teachers from routinely being required to participate in administrative tasks or external examination invigilation
  • Restricting occasions upon which teachers can be required to provide cover to rare and unforeseen circumstances.

While the majority of academy trusts have continued to adopt STPCD, a number of academy trusts have seized the opportunity to carve out their own terms and conditions.

In some cases, this has resulted in teachers being awarded more than the maximum pay currently permitted in STPCD, while a handful of multi-academy trusts have offered alternative pension schemes in which employer contributions are reduced in favour of enhanced take-home salaries.

The government, however, believes that creating a consistent pay and conditions package across all state-funded schools will promote partnership between schools.

There may also be an intention to level the playing field by removing any perceived advantages trusts have had over local authority maintained schools in recruitment and retention efforts.

It also argues the change will give academy trust a voice in national pay and conditions for the first time.

What this means for academy trusts

The department for education has given assurances it will task STRB with considering additional flexibilities to make STPCD most effective for all schools. This appears to be a nod to academy trusts but it remains to be seen what these flexibilities will look like. Changes aren’t expected to be made earlier than 2026.

Since unveiling the bill, the government has also tabled an amendment clarifying it will only set a minimum pay band, with no ceiling. While this has removed one potential issue for academy trusts that may have been forced to amend contracts, other concerns will remain.

An inability to differentiate their offer from maintained schools could also provide new recruitment and retention challenges for trusts, while their teachers could perceive any shift towards standardisation as a step backward, potentially leading to decreased staff morale.

In addition, reducing academies’ autonomy might hamper their ability to adapt quickly to the unique demands of their communities. This shift could potentially impact the dynamic nature of academies, making it more challenging for them to address specific needs.

The immediate task for trusts should be to review the terms and conditions in operation across their network and understand where they may deviate from the existing STPCD.

If on the brink of launching a new pay policy or other new terms and conditions, they may wish to consider the impact proposals in the Bill could have.

While changes can still be made ahead of the draft legislation coming into force, consideration should be given of potentially having to make further changes to align with a future version of STPCD.

Most importantly, schools and academy trusts should ensure they keep abreast of the developments in this area as these proposals play out.

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One comment

  1. Just a point. The most expensive independent special schools are also funded by public money and many teachers and leaders do not benefit from the STPCD. As these schools are exactly the same in terms of being funded by public money, and they are ‘independent’ does this mean that they will also by law have to abide by the STPCD. In my opinion they should!!