The Sunday Times led this week on a story about Academy'fat cats', one focus being the CEO of charitable company Swale Academies Trust (SWAT) with his £170,000 annual salary and the four BMWs provided for him and three other top Trust Executives to carry out their duties. A Public Relations Consultant, employed by the Trust, described the CEO as 'hands on, who needed to drive between the trust’s 17 schools in Kent. Having a company BMW made his “frequent long journeys safe and comfortable”, allowing him to “focus on improving the schools in his care”'. It is astonishing that a PR company could allow such an arrogant, misleading and factually false representation of the Trust's situation.
Coincidentally, I had been looking at the Trust's finances with regard to two Kent Local Authority schools they have managed recently, preparing to taking them over as sponsored Academies. When The North School, Ashford, was taken over three years ago it had a budget surplus of £244,000 which has now been turned into a deficit of around £300,000. The Community College, Whitstable, had a budget deficit of around £600,000 a year ago before its takeover, but this is now approaching a million pounds down. KCC is paying the Trust £200,000 p.a. for each school to manage them until conversion. At that time the two schools' deficits will be settled by KCC, the norm for new sponsored academies. The losses will then be met from KCC maintained school budgets at a cost to all remaining Local Authority schools, so clearly there is no incentive for SWAT to economise, and apparently no accountability for their actions.
The Sunday Times Article
I examined the pay of the best rewarded Kent academy heads in an article last year when, for 2014-15, the highest was paid £170,000 p.a. for running a moderately performing single school Academy Trust. In passing, the highest paid primary head was on £160,000 for running a small but disastrously managed three school Multi Academy Trust (MAT). The CEO of SWAT was on £150,000 p.a. that year, so he has had a 13% pay increase over 2015-2016, whilst teachers' pay was pegged at a 1% Increase.
I am not sure if the claim that the CEO of SWAT runs 17 schools in Kent was a mistake by The Sunday Times, by the PR company, or the Trust, but SWAT actually has just eight schools in Kent, three in Sittingbourne, two secondary and two primaries in nearby towns and another primary in Ashford. There are also a secondary school in Sussex and a primary in SE London. It may be that the two managed schools, along with a third in Sussex, are included, although not actually in the Trust, but this still only makes thirteen schools in total. In either case I cannot see how this profile requires a BMW to make the CEO's 'frequent long journeys safe and comfortable”', rather than use his own car and claim travel expenses. The mind boggles at three other Trust Executives also whizzing about and needing to make 'frequent long journeys safe and comfortable”'.
For reference, apart from the out county schools, the two in Ashford are a whole 28 miles, or half an hour's journey from Sittingbourne, next furthest is Whitstable 23 miles away, with two Gravesham schools 22 miles distant. Clearly, appropriate planning of visits to these schools would minimise the stress caused by the journeys.
Two of the four Senior Executives with their BMWs are presumably the Exexutive Head Secondary (salary £160,000) and Executive Head Primary, with just seven and six schools respectively to oversee on their frequent long journeys.
The Magic Money Tree
Some of the figures quoted in the introduction relating to the two managed schools are approximations but have been provided by several sources, and cross referenced where possible. I had planned to delay publication until confirmation by a Freedom of Information request I have submitted, but the Sunday Times article has precipitated matters. However, whilst I remain confident these are close to the exact figures, I am obviously prepared to update them as and when I receive official data.
There is no suggestion anywhere that SWAT has behaved unlawfully or irregularly, but nevertheless it has clearly absorbed large sums of money through its management of the two schools, whilst running them without the need to operate to the tight budgetary constraints imposed on all others. Presumably the significant staff restructuring taking place in each school would be covered by the £200,000 management fee.
Swale Academy Trust also took on two other struggling schools from KCC, presumably with a similar financial arrangement. These were Chaucer Technology School, Canterbury and Pent Valley Technology College, Folkestone, although both have since been closed, any deficits and management fees being subsumed.
The North School
was placed in Special Measures in December 2013, and SWAT took over in February 2014. A subsequent Report in June 2015 saw the school out of SM and into Requires Improvement. Nevertheless, whilst it was oversubscribed for September 2014 before the change in management it is now by several measures the least popular of the four Ashford non-selective schools, with 15% vacancies on allocation in March and the lowest proportion of first choices in the District.
The financial surplus of £244,000 immediately before SWAT took over shows that at least the school was being financially well managed, but to take £600,000 in management fees to turn this into a £300,000 deficit takes some doing. A million pounds to play with should certainly have seen some improvement, although I am aware from personal knowledge that this is not the perception of many parents.
The Community College, Whitstable
has limped along for some years, and it was not astonishing to learn that the previous headteacher had been removed. It soon became clear that the disciplinary procedures had not been properly followed and an expensive financial settlement was agreed. One of the issues was presumably financial management and the school was taken over by Swale Academies Trust in May last year, with a deficit of some £600,000. One would have thought inheriting this loss and bringing it under control should have been a central task for SWAT, but to allow it to rise to close on a million pounds in a year is surely carelessness or a deliberate strategy with no penalty for which the Trust has been paid £200,000. The price of £1,000,000 to be paid for by KCC controlled schools will presumably be no issue for the Trust, but hey, there should at least now be a good school in Whitstable for the first time in many years.
Final Thought
One can only hope that Kent County Council is challenging this excess expenditure as it failed to do in the notorious and possibly parallel case of the late Furness School that closed with debts of £1.6 million paid for by Kent maintained schools, run up by the free spending unlamented Lilac Sky Schools Academy Trust.
Least