Delegates at the annual Labour Party conference in Brighton have today passed a motion that would bring about the end of academies and multi-academy trusts if Labour came to power.

The motion proposes to bring all publically funded schools under the control of their local authority where they would be overseen by “a local education committee”.

The motion cites “a series of failings, scandals and collapses” relating to academy schools and MATs, and says they could be “a charter for profiteering”.

Read: Bigger MATs are less efficient, report finds

Ofsted:  ‘Let us inspect MATs’

Academies: Trusts ranked on Ofsted ratings

Moving the motion, Melanie Griffiths from the Socialist Education Association, said: “We need a system based on the needs of learners and not on a school’s place in the league tables.

“All MATs will be broken up and all academies will be brought back into the local authority.”

Seconder Benjamin Davy said MAT chief executives were earning “grotesque salaries”.

He said: “We have allowed the toxicity of profit and Darwinistic market forces to infiltrate the area of the things we hold most precious - our children.”

The motion calls for Labour to:

• Stop all academisations and the opening of academies and free schools.
• Ensure local authorities establish reformed, democratically accountable local education committees with stakeholder representation.
• Ensure all publicly funded schools be brought back under the control of these new local education committees.
• Ensure the newly empowered local education committees will be the default providers of services and will be appropriately funded.