So, the regulatory review - which will look at how a fully academised system will be created and regulated - at last begins.  

To some, this is a welcome focus, which will consider the various actors in the current system and what role they should play moving forward: Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), Department for Education (DfE), regional schools commissioners, director generals, local authorities, Ofsted, trust boards, parents and children. 

But do we really understand what problem we are trying to solve here?

I have spent a significant amount of time this year trying to deepen my understanding of trust governance and leadership. I have been trying to consider governance within the context of our existing regulatory framework.  

There are so many actors governing our system that I have often thought there isn’t much room left for trustees and local governors.  

School governance 

Ofsted regulates our standards in school, curriculum, leadership and so on. The DfE regulates our trust standards and plans. The ESFA regulates safeguarding, funding and governance. Auditors regulate our compliance to policy and law. Local authorities regulate our admissions, exclusions and special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) provision.  

There are, no doubt, other players in this game but you get the picture.  

We then have local governors, executive leaders and trustees in multi-academy trusts (MATs) all vying for some space to challenge our headteachers and trust leaders in the tiny gaps left by the regulators.  

In a large trust, working across different regions, it can often feel a little disjointed and difficult to find proper space for local governance. What’s more, the regulation from all angles breeds “mocksted” style quality assurance: a desire to be regulating one step ahead of the regulator.

This rather crowded system presents other challenges, too, and not necessarily the right kind. In a trust model of governance, with a number of schools, servicing the regulators is a full-time job in itself. Then add in all of the committee meetings, writing papers for the committees and trust board meetings, and governance can feel exhausting.

Governance review

The review of the regulatory framework should consider regulation in the round. What is externally regulated and what may be left for trust boards and governing bodies? The cumulative impact of governance and regulation can feel like a burden; like driving with the handbrake on.

If governance and regulation can be considered in the same breath, are they effectively the brakes that slow us down, protect us from crashing, manage risk? Or do we need to think about them a little differently? Could these “brakes” be the tools that make us go faster; that allow us to go further, be more innovative, take more risks? (The idea being that you don’t need brakes if you go slow but knowing you have them gives you the confidence to put your foot down and accelerate.)  

I want the regulatory review to tidy up the bureaucracy of governance in the system; to create space for trust boards and local governing bodies; to clarify the actors in the system and to consider how each agency contributes to improving our education system.  

We need to have more confidence in our system, to re-examine our risk appetite and, as a sector, to stop replicating the work of regulators in our schools.  

Fundamentally, are we brave enough to trust our trusts?  

Is this government prepared to hand over the throttle to school and trust leaders and let us get on with the business of accelerating our work in schools, going further and faster with full confidence that the regulatory system is there to safeguard and protect when needed, and not to get in the way and slow us down? I for one, certainly hope so.

Tom Campbell is interim chief executive at E-ACT