The Staggers

The New Statesman’s rolling politics blog

Gove reveals plan for profit-making schools

Education Secretary declares that free schools "could" become for-profit.

By George Eaton Published 29 May 2012 15:38

Education Secretary Michael Gove arrives at the Leveson inquiry

Education Secretary Michael Gove waves to photographers as he arrives at The Royal Courts of Justice to give evidence to the Leveson inquiry. Photograph: Getty Images.

Michael Gove's appearance at the Leveson inquiry has provided us with a revelation, but not the one you might have expected. For the first time on record, the Education Secretary declared that free schools "could" become for-profit institutions in the second term of a Tory-led government.

Gove told the inquiry:

It's my belief that we could move to that situation but at the moment, it's important to recorgnise that the free schools movement is succeeding without that element and I think we should cross that bridge when we come to it.

He remarked that unlike some of his coalition colleagues, "who are very sceptical of the benefits of profit", he had an "open mind", adding: "I believe that it may be the case that we can augment the quality of state education by extending the range of people involved in its provision."

It's a significant rhetorical shift by Gove. Last September he told the Andrew Marr Show:

Nick (Clegg) and I are completely in agreement on this (banning for-profit free schools). It's not an issue.

The Conservative election manifesto said that we don't need to have profit at the moment, the Liberal Democrat manifesto said that we don't need profit at the moment and we don't.

And here's what Clegg said:

To anyone worried that, by expanding the mix of providers in our education system, we are inching towards inserting the profit motive into our school system, again, let me reassure you. Yes to greater diversity; yes to more choice for parents. But no to running schools for profit, not in our state-funded education sector.

Gove's comments are another example of the growing willingness of the Tories to state how a Conservative government would behave differently from the coalition.

Tags: Michael Gove Education Free Schools

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14 comments

Fri, 2012-07-20 11:34 — Goji (not verified)

Nice article..... interesting.
Goji Goji fructe goji

Wed, 2012-07-11 19:37 — ahmadnasr89

Wed, 2012-05-30 12:00 — Silican (not verified)

It has never ceased to amaze me how bottom feeders, like Gove, have managed to crawl out of the mud. Gobbling up Murdoch bait, like everything foul in our government, has something to do with it no doubt.

Tue, 2012-05-29 20:45 — Davidaslindsay (not verified)

Michael Gove's copies of the King James Bible, now sent to every state school in England, feature a reference to Gove himself on their very spines. Is there a picture of him? If not, why not? There is, after all, a foreword by him. That's right. "The Bible, with a foreword by Michael Gove." I am not making this up.

At best, these Bibles will be given away as booby prizes. Many will simply be put in the recycling bin. And the hostility towards Gove will cause a number to be put to rather worse use than any of that. Do not be surprised if effigies of him are clutching them atop bonfires come 5th November. In fact, be very surprised if that does not happen at least somewhere. That sort of thing will not, or very rarely, be anything against the Bible. It will be against Michael Gove. Those sent to the Catholic and a few other schools will be respectfully enough placed on a library shelf, never to leave it. The number that will ever be seen by pupils is negligible. Seen by them when, exactly?

Oh, well, at least it keeps him out of the way of foreign policy, I suppose. As a very hardline neoconservative, he looks to a certain concept of the country that until the 1950s, when the practice was quietly discontinued but never abolished, presented every new member of Congress with a copy of The Jefferson Bible, from which the eponymous author had excised all reference to Our Lord's miracles, Resurrection or Divinity. I am not aware that anyone ever declined it, or that there was even any sense that it was voluntary. Did any of them swear their Oaths of Office on it? Did any of them not?

If The Jefferson Bible, then why not The Book of Mormon? Or why not the King James Bible, but with a foreword by Michael Gove, and with a reference to that Prophet, Apostle, Seer and Revelator on the spine? To be presented to every new member of either House of Parliament, and on which they would swear their Oaths of Office. I ask again, is there a picture of him? And I ask again, if not, why not?

Tue, 2012-05-29 20:00 — Janet Logan (not verified)

And finally they admit it. How about they finally admit their plans for the NHS while they're at it.
Businesses all have a bottom line and a profit margin to protect, and the benefit of the customer, the education of pupils in this instance, is secondary to those aims.

Tue, 2012-05-29 22:15 — Mr Danger

That's nice, but non-profit state schools have been failing our children spectacularly. It seems like some people would rather keep it that way than risk the horror of someone making a profit on something.

Tue, 2012-05-29 23:52 — Janet Logan (not verified)

Some things should not be monetarised. Education and healthcare are the two prime examples. Prisons and the justice system are a close third. What century are we humans supposed to be living in? Personally I do not subscribe to the notion that only the private sector can succeed and public ownship always fails.

Wed, 2012-05-30 10:53 — Mr Danger

"Personally I do not subscribe to the notion that only the private sector can succeed and public ownship always fails."

So that's why you want to deny other people the choice of going to a for profit school?

Tue, 2012-06-05 17:07 — Kevin Leonard (not verified)

No matter how much for profit schools make or how many are authorised as long as absolutely NO PUBLIC MONEY is used to set them up and sustain them in the first instance. IF you or anyone else wishes to set up a FOR PROFIT school then by all means use your own money do not expect the tax payer to fund your future profits.

Tue, 2012-05-29 23:15 — Danny Halas (not verified)

Yeah, having greed crop come in and extract massive amounts of tax payer money from failing schools should turn them all around. As if the choice is automatically between a failed school and a privately run one.

Also the horror I personally feel about these mad proposals is connected to the Swedish example. Profits in state schools are being generated by filling teaching posts with untrained staff.

Tue, 2012-05-29 18:21 — Barrie J (not verified)

It seems that it's now the only way that the private sector can achieve the much promised growth.
Steal money from the taxpayer.
It appears that they have run out of any other ideas.
'Free Schools' - what a joke, I can imagine the Cabinet having a really good laugh over that one, - no accountability, no FOI, etc., etc.

Tue, 2012-05-29 17:25 — matthew fox (not verified)

Shouldn't the motivation be to educate children, not see them as a means of making money.

Bet we are talking about no oversight financially, no educational oversight, and shoving chips down the throats of school children.

Glad to know we are going to pick the tab in years to come

Tue, 2012-05-29 16:48 — mike cobley (not verified)

More massively loathsome degradation, courtesy of the radical extremists currently masquerading as the Conservative party. After all, that's why education, health, the prison, the police service etc all exist, to provide revenue streams and big fat greasy profits for private sector leeches. If ever a political toad deserved a good pie-ing, it is Gove.

Tue, 2012-05-29 16:03 — Dishevelled (not verified)

And another example of how the Lid Dems have allowed the Tories set themselves up for further liberalisation once the LDs are out the way. Did Nick seriously think that the Tories didn't see this policy as exactly what Nick chose to think it isn't - an inching towards profit-making schools in the state-funded sector?