| | | | | | Academy Trust Governance Code | | The framework for academy governance has, since 2010, been based on the Academies Financial Handbook/Academy Trust Handbook. The various versions of the Handbook have been built upon existing company and charity law requirements, Charity Commission guidance, and the requirements of HM Treasury as laid out in Managing Public Money. The Handbook has typically evolved on an iterative basis, with annual updates being driven primarily by the evolution of both good and bad practice: in many respects the Handbook has evolved more in response to the bad than the good. | | The draft Academy Trust Governance Code is a voluntary code that draws upon the Charity Governance Code and relevant Department for Education guidance. It sets out the principles, desired outcomes, and recommended practice for effective academy trust governance. The Code is intended to be a voluntary tool for continuous improvement in academy trust governance and it is hoped that all trusts will aspire to meet all aspects of the code over time. | | | | The Code represents probably the first attempt by a sector group to take responsibility for defining best-practice governance acting independently of the DfE.
The Code has been developed by a group of organisations on behalf of the academy trust sector, including the Confederation of School Trusts. The Code is similar to existing corporate governance codes in that it starts with a Foundation Principle of adherence to the Nolan Principles, supported by an additional seven further principles. The Code follows a ‘comply or explain’ model which again mirrors early versions of corporate governance codes from the listed company arena.
Tomas Thurogood-Hyde, Assistant CEO & Company Secretary at Astrea Academy Trust, is a member of the steering group that produced the Code. He has provided a personal commentary on the thinking and intentions behind the Code, which he has kindly agreed to let us share. | | Symbolism matters. The Code is a statement that we're a mature sector, with a proactive interest in our own sectoral governance. Historically, there's been a bit too much waiting to see what the Minister thinks good governance is. The Code's ambitions in important areas raise the bar from what we've had before. | | | | For example, environmental considerations don't appear in the DfE's Handbook (although they are mentioned in the statutory accounting framework), but fall under Principle 1 of the draft Code. Ethics appear three times in the Handbook, all in relation to financial reporting standards – those are clearly important, but the Code spells out that ethical behaviours are expected to be at the very core of governance, in line with the Nolan Principles.
The Code starts to bridge the gap in terminology and understanding between voluntary ("Church") schools and the wider sector. At the moment, a lot of guidance confuses or ignores some important differences. The draft Code emphasises the importance of the governance professional, proposing a proactive role for them and putting them in the decisive governance conversations. This may prove a challenge for the smaller schools where the role of governance professional is often juggled alongside other roles within the school, and where the role is often focused upon procedure and minute-taking as opposed to advice and implementation. | | The Code raises the bar on stakeholder engagement, encouraging Boards to map stakeholders and to formalise means of understanding students', parents' and other community views. This isn't intended to become a legal or regulatory Code. If something doesn't work for your trust, you don't have to do it, but it does give a stimulus for saying why and sharing that with the sector. | | | | Is it too long and does it duplicate existing guidance? This is what the steering group wrestled with because we wanted something comprehensive but manageable enough to be useful. My view on length is that this is the kind of work that needs to be taken one piece at a time. I would have a read through, see which area I thought my trust needed to work on first and adapt those principles to my action plan. Whether "pick 'n' mix" or modular, the draft Code allows for plenty of agency.
Is there too much duplication between the Code and the existing documents? My take on it is that we can't not follow existing DfE expectations and we don't want to confuse things so, where a point is worth making, we might as well use very similar language. However, the Code uses some existing material, e.g. in relation to equality to push the bar higher, as described previously. The governance professional bits are a good example of this, reiterating the essential compliance functions but then expanding and building upon these.
So have your say! As academy governance experts will know, there can be a lot of "define or be defined". The steering group will not have got everything right so there's scope for change and it would be nice to hear that colleagues think it would be useful. The full draft of the Code can be found here. The consultation period closes on 31 July 2023. | | | | | | | | If you would like to arrange a virtual meeting to discuss your specific circumstances in relation to any of the above, please get in touch with your usual contact within James Cowper Kreston or contact me using the details below.
Mike Bath Partner
T: +44 (0) 7557 340691 | E: MBath@jamescowper.co.uk | | | | The information in this newsletter must not be relied on as giving sufficient advice in any specific case. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
