We Won't Slow Down City Academies Says Minister at the Centre of the Storm

Summary

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THE MINISTER in charge of the city academies programme today mounted his first public defence of the policy after claims that peerages were offered to would-be sponsors, claiming that suspending plans to extend more independently-run schools would be "a dereliction of our public duty".

In an interview with the Evening Standard, Lord Adonis, the schools minister and most influential Blairite thinker on education, rejected calls from Labour backbenchers to slow down or halt the academies programme - which has seen 27 being built and another 200 planned by 2010. He also denied he had been endangered by a Sunday newspaper's revelations involving Des Smith, the representative of a government trust set up to promote academies, which suggested honours had been offered in return for backing the city academies.

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Extract

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We Won't Slow Down City Academies Says Minister at the Centre of the Storm

He insisted: "I'm not aware of a single sponsor preparing to withdraw their backing. I have had nothing but statements of support this week. It will only be a problem if we lose our nerve...

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