Government cost-cutters have urged one of England’s biggest trusts to rethink its growth strategy and “proactively” search for schools to add to its ranks.
But the Elliot Foundation Academies Trust (TEFAT) says that “using public money” to court schools is “a misuse of funds”.
The trust recently took the rare step of publishing its school resource management adviser (SRMA) report.
SRMAs – normally school business leaders – started visiting schools in 2018 as part of a money-saving drive under Lord Agnew, the then-academies minister.
TEFAT was visited after posting in-year deficits in 2022 and 2023, with Hugh Greenway, its chief executive, attributing the deficits to unfunded pay rises and energy price hikes.
However, after registering a surplus last year and forecasting another this year, the adviser said creating the normal list of costed recommendations to help the trust save money was not his “main priority”.
Instead he suggested Elliot should review its “organisational decision to not proactively approach schools or smaller trusts to instigate the conversation about joining”.
Wanting schools to join ‘for the right reasons’
The report said the trust only responded to requests and did not want “to be seen to be pressuring schools to join them”.
“This ensures that schools are coming to them for the right reasons and that the values of the potential new school will be better aligned.”
But the adviser argued the MAT – which runs 36 academies – should regard itself as a “strong” chain with “much to offer”. It “could have a significantly positive impact on other vulnerable children’s life outcomes”.
The report, dated September 2024 to March 2025, recommended that “TEFAT consider identifying schools that fit its values and delivery model and become more proactive in looking to initiate those conversations”.
“Equally the [Department for Education] should regard [the trust] as a strong partner to have in helping find solutions for schools that may be struggling for financial, educational or other reasons.”
Greenway said he published the report online for transparency, pointing to the requirement for openness outlined in the Nolan principles.
However, he has knocked back the recommendation to start proactively approaching schools.
‘Change is complex’
“Anyone who tells you they have all the answers in education is either lying to you or selling you something. Change is complex, messy and takes time,” he said.
Describing the trust’s growth as “organic”, he added: “Using public money to market one solution over another is a misuse of public funds – we don’t put up big banners, we don’t do sales pitches, we don’t have brochures.”
The process of academy trusts taking over schools has been criticised in the past.
In 2022 Baroness Barran, a former academies minister, accepted that more “transparency” was needed in government decision-making over academisation and the transfers of schools into new trusts.
The following year Schools Week analysis showed just one in 10 regional director meetings – which rule over trust growth plans – had representations from the public.
The findings backed up concerns important academy decisions were determined with little input from parents.
Concerns over ‘beauty parades’
There have also been concerns about “beauty parades” in which several trusts pitch to schools looking for new guardians.
“If you go and promote to a school, they’re going to be sceptical,” Greenway said. “We wait to be asked, either by the school or the DfE.”
Sam Henson, the deputy chief executive of the National Governance Association, said not all big trusts found growth to be the panacea it had sometimes promised to be and that not all small chains found their size “holds them back”.
Adopting a “deliberately non-assertive approach to growth” could be a “strategic decision – not a lack of ambition – grounded in a belief that growth should be organic and driven by relationships and readiness, rather than imposed or pursued under pressure”.
However, Greenway has previously said primary-only trusts – such as his – need at least 10,000 pupils to be “sustainable”. As of August last year, it educated more than 13,000 pupils.
Elsewhere, the SRMA report recommended the trust reduce money spent on administrative supplies and use the government’s free teacher vacancy website more.
Latest government figures, obtained through freedom of information, show SRMAs identified £964,000 of “three-year cumulative savings opportunities” per school in 2023-24.
But the government only keeps track of any savings made within the first six months of visits, which are a fraction of the amounts identified.
Your thoughts