More than one in 10 academy trusts had a member of staff with a pay and pension package of £150,000 or more, according to a new Department for Education (DfE) report.

Figures show that there were 325 trusts across the country where a member of staff had a salary and employer pension contributions of £150,000 or more in 2018-19.

This represented 11.1 per cent of academy trusts in the sector, according to the report published today.

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The tables also show that almost half of all academy trusts had a member of staff with a pay package of between £100,000 and £150,000 in 2018-19.

It shows that there were 1,387 trusts that had at least one member of staff with a pay and pension package at this level.

This represented 47.5 per cent of the sector.

It is not possible to do a like for like comparison with the previous year as the 2018-19 figures include pension contributions while the 2017-18 figures did not.

In 2017-18 the DfE tables show that there were 146 trusts paying more than £150,000 - 4.8 per cent of the sector. And 988 trusts were paying a member of staff between £100,000 and £150,000 - 32.4 per cent of academy trusts in the sector.

The new figures are contained in the DfE’s Academy schools sector in England: consolidated annual report and accounts for 2018-19 published today.

The Education and Skills Funding Agency has been clamping down on top-level academy trust pay by challenging the boards of academy trusts who pay a salary of more than £150,000 or who have multiple members of staff on six-figure salaries to justify their decisions.

In a foreword to today’s report Academies Minister Baroness Berridge said: “Regarding high pay, I will continue to challenge where it is neither proportionate nor directly linked to improving pupil outcomes.

“DfE has taken a number of steps to challenge high pay and to ensure that there is transparency in reporting.”