Academies Bill [HL]

The noble Baroness is very quick on her feet this afternoon but that is not the sort of list we are talking about. The list in Amendment 3 is dangerous because it probably leaves somebody out. In an individual school’s case, there may well be somebody who is appropriate to consult but who is not in the list. There are times when you have to trust schools. You have to trust what was in the Government’s amendment on Report, which is now in the Bill, that appropriate consultation must take place. Matters such as this will have widespread publicity within a local area, and any organisation that believes it is an appropriate group within the terms of the previous amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Hill, but has not been consulted will certainly jump up and down and shout about the matter, making sure that the governors of the school know its view on whether the school should go ahead. I remind the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, that a school does not become an academy until the point of conversion. Although I personally strongly encourage schools to consult at the earliest appropriate moment, as I have already encouraged them to do in this Chamber, it must be done according to what we have in the Bill now, before conversion. That is vital.