There has been a lot of commentary around the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill - which returns to Parliament today - some political, some educational.

While the education secretary says she relishes the debate, the school leaders I talk to are more concerned about being caught in political crosshairs when all they want to do is deliver a good education for their pupils.

Bridget Phillipson is right to focus on standards. She proudly claims that it was the Labour government that introduced academies, and rightly so.

The first-hand account of that introduction, penned by Lord Adonis in his book Education, Education, Education, paints vividly the battles that he had to fight, both within Whitehall and the education establishment, to get them introduced.

Reading it today shows simultaneously how much has changed in the past 20 years and just how much has stayed the same. The sink comprehensives and low expectations that failed generations of disadvantaged pupils feel consigned to the past, whereas ministers were missing teacher recruitment targets in the 2000s, too.

A warning from the past

But this book is also a warning about some of the measures that will be scrutinised by MPs today.

In one striking section on page 76, Lord Adonis writes: “As soon as the first projects took shape, political and official pressure was relentless to make academies as much like local authority comprehensives as possible.”

He continues: “Size, curriculum, age range, governance, teacher pay and condition, building design, the school day and year, the precise form of all ability admissions: the pressure to conform to local or national norms and initiatives was constant… But resist I did, and the model remained intact.”

This could almost be a checklist for what is in the bill:

• Size - to be dictated by a local authority and school adjudicator.
• Curriculum - to follow the, currently under review, national curriculum.
• Teachers pay - floor not ceiling, thankfully.
• Teacher conditions - due regard to national conditions, with central innovations (whatever that means).
• School day and year - see conditions.

National norms

The pressure to conform to national norms seems to be the driving force behind the changes to qualified teacher status, the curriculum and pay and conditions, rather than any problems that having these freedoms is causing in the classroom.

And new national norms are being created with centralised uniform rules and adding “breakfast giver” to the long list of tasks that educators now find themselves responsible for.

The government’s words on academies have warmed and they have been rightfully praised for the school improvement they have overseen, but the proposals in this bill remain ones that will fundamentally change the model of an academy.

And that’s why I, as the director of the New Schools Network, care so much about this bill.

Because while the future of the free schools programme looks challenging - the bill ends the free school presumption and the government’s review into 44 mainstream free school projects in the pipeline is ongoing - what a free school or academy is, is being redefined by this legislation.

It is the model that has seen hundreds of failing schools turned around. It is Michaela Community School’s utilisation of the school freedoms that free schools have which has enabled it to top the Progress 8 charts for three years running.

Keep the beacons of hope lit

A moving section in Lord Adonis’ book recalls Bill Thomas, former Labour leader of Sandwell council, realising the transformative power of academies and saying: “I want one of these [an academy] as soon as possible: it will be a beacon on the hill for the working class kids in my area.”

Many academies are such beacons, but with the pressures that schools are facing at the moment - from teacher recruitment to attendance, behaviour and special educational needs and disabilities - debates about models and structures are hardly going to be front of mind for Mrs Jones as she tackles quadratic equations with Year 9.

But while it is Mrs Jones’ responsibility to teach our children, it is the responsibility of legislators to make good legislation.

It is not too late for the government to recognise that Lord Adonis was right to protect the academy model. It is not too late for MPs to act to amend the bill to leave the model alone so academies - and Mrs Jones - can keep delivering a fantastic education for the country’s children.

Meg Powell-Chandler is director of the New Schools Network

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