Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
    • Advertise
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Equality, diversity and inclusion
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • XpertHR
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Pricing
    • Free trial
    • Subscribe
    • XpertHR USA
  • Webinars
  • OHW+

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
    • Advertise
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Equality, diversity and inclusion
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • XpertHR
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Pricing
    • Free trial
    • Subscribe
    • XpertHR USA
  • Webinars
  • OHW+

HR practiceHR strategyOutsourcingThe HR profession

The HR implications of academy schools

by Personnel Today 9 Aug 2010
by Personnel Today 9 Aug 2010

The Academies Act gives all maintained schools the opportunity to become academies.

The first tranche of these new publicly funded academies are expected to open in September 2010. They will be free from local authority control, meaning they have autonomy over the decisions they make and the education they deliver to pupils. They will also have the freedom to set their own pay and conditions for staff, and will be able to buy-in private services.

Most local authority (LA) maintained schools currently use the local council’s HR department. The LA top-slices schools’ budgets in order to fund this and a school has to pay the authority for providing services such as payroll. Under the new system, academies will be able to buy-in HR services from third parties.

What does this mean for the future of HR in the schools sector?

“Academies can buy their HR from whomever they please,” says Dale Bassett, research director at think tank Reform. “They could get it from the LA – although most feel that provision is substandard and so don’t – they can hire an in-house HR team; or they can buy the services they require from a third party.”

According to Martin Freedman, head of pay and conditions at the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL), this runs the risk of unscrupulous firms touting for business. “From day one academies will become employers. You can’t just build up an HR function in those circumstances. Our big fear is these firms saying: ‘we will do HR for you’. What could happen is the HR functions in local authorities could wither away because they would not have the schools to advise; councils could ditch their functions, which means schools that aren’t academies could struggle.”

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers (NUT), is also sceptical about an upsurge in outsourcing. “In some cases the local authority or diocese may provide HR advice and support, in other cases it may be outsourced to a private provider. This in itself has led to industrial relations problems where outsourced providers failed to understand fully the context and traditions of the education service and the employment of teachers.”

However, Anastasia de Waal, a social policy analyst and director of family and education at think tank Civitas, doubts there will be an appetite for change: “We are talking about teachers, not managers here. They are glad to have the things not in their expertise outsourced so they can get on with the job they are supposed to do. Whilst I am sure there are gross inefficiencies in terms of HR functions in local authorities, I wouldn’t think it is something schools would want to take on.”

In the immediate future, when schools convert to academies they are subject to the Transfer of Employment (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006 (TUPE), so there should be only minimal immediate effects on the contractual rights of teachers and other staff. But critics of the scheme have argued that its approach may encourage pay inequality to creep back into the system.

Blower says the NUT is concerned that teachers who are no longer employed within the local authority “family” will have fewer opportunities to move between schools, or to be redeployed in the case of redundancy. “A further concern is that a two-tier workforce can develop if academy governing bodies refuse to abide by national pay and conditions arrangements,” she warns. “Those joining the school can be employed on different terms and conditions, or offered an entirely different benefits package.”

Potential difficulties

She also points out there could be difficulties with maintaining long-established bargaining arrangements. “Historically, many employers have voluntarily chosen to recognise trade unions and apply local bargaining arrangements because of the benefits this brings to the workplace. With new employers being encouraged to look to different models, there is a danger that these arrangements could become fragmented.”

Freedman also fears the problem of pay inequality might make an unwelcome return. Currently all maintained schools have a national pay and conditions framework set by The School Teachers’ Review Body. “[The body] looks at aspects of teachers pay and conditions, and makes recommendations to government,” says Freedman. “If you remove that, and schools under new legislation are allowed to opt out, things start to become murky. It’s much more likely to result in inequality and unfairness.”

Overall, Bassett believes the move to academies is positive one and says as existing schools converting to academy status will fall under TUPE, it is “unlikely” that teachers’ pay or conditions will change significantly. However, he adds: “Over time, however, academy freedoms over pay and conditions will allow heads to introduce innovations such as performance-related pay.

“While this could act as an incentive for the best teachers, there is obviously a risk that underperforming teachers will feel marginalised. Heads will have to bear this in mind when implementing this kind of change.”

At the time of writing, about 150 schools had formally applied for conversion. Time will tell what path the future of HR in the schools sector is likely to take.

The Department for Education has a range of FAQs relating to HR matters on its website, including TUPE and pension arrangements.

Personnel Today
Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

previous post
Coalition Government’s deregulation drive – which employment laws could be scrapped?
next post
Employers happy with younger workers but skills gap persists

You may also like

New chief people officer at TSB: Ariam Enraght-Moony

28 Sep 2023

What does it mean to be an HR...

22 Sep 2023

AI has positive impact on jobs market, report...

20 Sep 2023

Toxic culture at immigration centre saw staff abuse...

19 Sep 2023

Long-term sickness crisis: how employee data can help

13 Sep 2023

Lloyds of London boss urges greater return to...

7 Sep 2023

EU-derived equal pay protections to be safeguarded

30 Aug 2023

Bank holidays: six things employers need to know

25 Aug 2023

Foreign workers’ interest in UK roles doubles

23 Aug 2023

How to avert burnout in HR

23 Aug 2023

  • Almost a fifth of UK workers feel undervalued – we need to solve this PROMOTED | A new report has found...Read more
  • Discover the value of CIPD accreditation PROMOTED | See how the CIPD can increase your earning potential...Read more
  • What does it mean to be an HR professional in 2024? (survey) PROMOTED | The world of HR is changing rapidly...Read more
  • The Contractor Management Mastery Pack: Everything you need to manage and pay global contractors PROMOTED | Answers to cross-border...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2023

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2023 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
    • Advertise
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Equality, diversity and inclusion
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • XpertHR
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Pricing
    • Free trial
    • Subscribe
    • XpertHR USA
  • Webinars
  • OHW+