Outsourcers taking control of under-performing LEAs

Ofsted, the education watchdog, is to publish a report into poor performance at Leicester City education authority suggesting outsourcing is now an acceptable move for helping poor-performing local education authorities.

The market for providing services to failing LEAs is estimated to be around £500m, with a report from education services consultants Capital Strategies suggesting the market is entering a period of rapid growth.

The government has a list of 10 companies and successful LEAs that will be allowed to compete for contracts to run services in under-performing authorities, such as Islington and Liverpool, which were strongly criticised in the Ofsted report.

Speaking about the need to raise standards, Estelle Morris, the School Standards Minister, said:

"There are inner city success stories but too often standards are not high enough. The Government will provide targeted support in six inner city areas. By April 2000 they will have been inspected by Ofsted and we will be able to decide how best to support them further."

It's also believed that companies outside the traditional outsourcing business will move into the new area, hoping to get a foot through the door into local authority work.

"We have asked OFSTED to inspect all authorities by September 2001, so that we will have a full picture of how each town hall is performing. Where they are not delivering the service that we expect we have always said - and shown - that we would use our powers to intervene," said Morris.

Allowing proven outsourcers to take control of failing LEA services would be the ultimate rap on the knuckles for poorly performing LEAs.

Gary Cutlack