Department for Education analysis of has revealed the trusts that received the most additional financial support in 2022-23.
, published today, list 51 instances where the Education and Skills Funding Agency provided additional support to 49 trusts and one council.
Three multi-academy trusts (MATs) received more than £1 million in additional financial support during the year.
The additional cash can be for a number of reasons, including to help trusts financially, but also to help facilitate the transfer of new schools into or out of the trust.
Some of the trusts listed have since ceased to exist. For example, Falcon Education Academies Trust, which was set up by the government in 2019, has since seen its academies rebrokered.
These are the 10 trusts that received the most additional financial support during 2022-23:
- Avanti Schools Trust - £1,882,003 (non-repayable) for building financial capacity.
- The Queensmill Trust - £1,429,228 (£1,169,228 non-repayable, £260,000 repayable) for enabling financial recovery.
- Coast and Vale Learning Trust - £1,060,262.35 (£319,262.35 non-repayable, £741,000 repayable) for facilitating transfer inwards, financially triggered.
- Hinckley Academy and John Cleveland 6th Form Centre - £865,134 (non-repayable) for enabling financial recovery.
- Falcon Education Academies Trust - £780,253 (non-repayable) for facilitating transfer outwards, financially and educationally triggered.
- Partnership Learning - £765,000 (non-repayable) for facilitating transfer outwards, financially triggered.
- Seckford Education Trust - £755,000 (repayable) short-term advance.
- The Pioneer Academy - £653,678 (non-repayable) for facilitating transfer inwards, financially and educationally triggered.
- The Watford UTC - £635,715 (non-repayable) for facilitating transfer outwards, financially triggered.
- Leigh Academies Trust - £566,367.74 (non-repayable) for facilitating transfer inwards, financially and educationally triggered.
Additional financial support provided during 2022-23 totalled more than £16 million, in a year that continued to see high energy costs and inflation.
The academy sector as a whole returned a surplus for the year of £4.6 billion, though this was much reduced compared with the previous year’s surplus of £18.5 billion.
The total cumulative deficit across the sector increased, and 55 trusts reported a cumulative deficit for the year - up from 46 in 2021-22.
More recent accounts analysis suggests finances in the academy sector have continued to decline since 2022-23.
Termination warning notices more than doubled
Elsewhere, the DfE found that termination warning notices issued to academies more than doubled in 2022-23 compared with the previous year.
There were 126 warning notices issued during the year - the majority (73) to converter academies. The previous year, 56 warning notices were issued.
The year also saw 163 schools issued with an academy order, up from 63 in 2021-22.
“The increase in the number of academy orders issued in 2022-23 is largely due to the increased intervention in schools not making necessary improvements,” the report says.
The academy trust oversight system was restructured in 2022, bringing in the Regions Group at the DfE and changing regional school commissioners to regional directors (RDs).
RDs would issue a termination warning notice to academies judged to be “inadequate” by Ofsted unless there were exceptional circumstances.
Rise in data breaches
The number of data breach incidents in the sector grew in 2022-23 to 278, affecting 130 trusts. This was a 50 per cent increase on the previous year, when there were 184 incidents, and a 90 per cent rise compared with 145 incidents pre-pandemic.
The National Cyber Security Centre estimated that more than three-quarters of the schools it audited in 2022 had experienced a cyberattack incident.
Tes revealed last week that just over a third of CEOs at the biggest MATs saw their pay increase by at least £10,000 from 2022-23 to 2023-24.
The DfE analysis reveals 775 academy trusts were paying at least one individual £150,000 or more in 2022-23, up from 594 in 2021-22.
The year also saw an increase in the value of suspected fraud against trusts to £1,781,413, compared with £786,507 in 2021-22.
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