Education publishers have urged ministers to rethink plans to relaunch Oak National Academy as an arm’s-length body with public funding and claimed the plans have not had proper parliamentary scrutiny.
The Publishers Association has criticised the government over the newly relaunched Oak National Academy, claiming it will be an “unnecessary” and “expensive burden on public funds”.
Dan Conway, chief executive of the Publishers Association - which represents educational publishers, authors and suppliers - said: “We urge the government to listen to the concerns of teachers and industry leaders alike and rethink its current plans”.
The comments came after it was revealed last week that Oak would receive £43 million in funding over the next three years, with plans to spend £8 million of the budget on purchasing new lesson resources.
Mr Conway said: “This news reaffirms that the government’s plans for Oak will be an unnecessary, expensive burden on public funds that will risk severely damaging teacher choice and learner outcomes.”
He added that publishers had spent “years investing time, knowledge, and huge amounts of money into creating world-leading resources for schools” and that this “intervention” would “undo everything the sector has achieved”.
Last week, ahead of the launch, former schools minister Will Quince announced that the Department for Education planned to use £6.6 million from the Contingencies Fund to establish Oak as an arm’s-length body.
Mr Quince said at the time that accessing the fund would allow the department to “manage the expenditure associated with establishing and launching the new body”.
Responding to this, Mr Conway said: “By seeking an advance from the Contingencies Fund, the Department of Education is proving that its plans are rushed and have not been subject to the levels of parliamentary scrutiny we would expect for such radical changes.”
An Oak National Academy spokesperson said: “Government has set aside up to £43 million over the next three years to support Oak National Academy, a significant proportion of which is expected to be provided directly to schools, publishers and other organisations for the creation of resources for pupils and teachers.
“A Contingencies Fund advance has been agreed by the Treasury to support the establishment of the ALB to deliver its work from September to April 2023.
“This is an administrative mechanism to ensure the funding is in place for the new ALB to deliver from the start of the new academic year.
“Funding will flow to the Department as part of the usual Supplementary Estimates process, at which point the Contingencies Fund advance will be repaid.”
A DfE spokesperson said: “Oak’s conversion to an arm’s-length body is an important step towards better supporting pupils’ learning by making sure teachers can access free, high-quality and adaptable curriculum resources and lesson plans.
“We recognise the importance of a competitive commercial market and so it will always be teachers who choose whether or not to use Oak’s, or any other provider’s, materials.”
‘Reconsider radical plans’
In July, the Publishers Association, alongside the British Educational Suppliers Association (BESA), Society of Authors, Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS), Publishers’ Licensing Services, and the Copyright Licensing Agency wrote to former education secretary James Cleverly to ask the DfE to “reconsider” its “radical plans”.
Oak transferred from The Reach Foundation to the DfE earlier this month, with a major curriculum partner, United Learning, making the decision not to transfer the intellectual property copyright to Oak.
At the time of the launch, interim chief executive Matt Hood said he was ”delighted that Oak National Academy” had launched in its “next chapter”.
He said: “Supporting teachers with developing their curriculum and tackling workload through sharing quality resources is not a job Oak can do alone.
“Our approach will be to build an open, broad and national collaboration. We want to work with a wide range of teachers, schools, subject associations, publishers, and other experts, to co-create new curriculum packages.”
He also repeated that Oak resources will “always remain free, totally optional and adaptable”.
