SCHOOLS in Northumberland are facing punitive and politically motivated fees when looking to improve results by converting to academies, an MP has claimed.

Hexham Conservative Guy Opperman has warned of continuing damage to the Government’s education reforms if Liberal Democrat-controlled Northumberland County Council is allowed to continue to impose excessively high pension contributions on schools converting to academies.

The council says the increased contributions are needed as the academies are in effect private companies for which the local authority is having to take on the risk of their pensions fund failing.

But headteachers, governors and political opponents claim the move results in hundreds of thousands of pounds being taken from funds intended for school resources.

Mr Opperman told a Commons debate he believed the pensions hike was politically motivated.

Haltwhistle Middle School, he said, was been prevented from converting as a result of the new fees it would face.

Mr Opperman added: “In Northumberland, the county council is requiring an extra pension contribution from an academy, of between 12% and 26%, whereas for a standard maintained school in the UK the average pension fund contribution for teachers earning less than £75,000 is approximately 8%.

“There is no financial justification for the measure and no other county in the country is following that course of action.

“Either the council’s pension fund panel is driving that unfair proposal forward to prevent schools from becoming academies or the council is fundamentally opposed to academy status. There can be no other reason, except that it would like to obtain greater sums from a would-be academy than from a maintained school.”

Mr Opperman has already led a delegation of school heads to meet education ministers over the issue.

He said: “As yet, nothing has changed. Some schools that want to become academies or are budgeting for the year ahead are facing larger pension contributions than those of their competitors and than those which they themselves previously enjoyed.

“In those circumstances, either there is an impact on their financial calculations because they are paying larger contributions or they are refusing to become academies when that is what head teachers, governors and local parents want, because they are worried about the larger contributions.

“One Northumberland school governor said: ‘We are being drained of funds by this issue, and it is draining away the optimism we had when we converted to an academy.’”

Northumberland County Council has said the surcharge is needed because the schools are no longer part of the council-controlled pension fund and to re-enter it they must take into account the increased risk.

Coun Andrew Tebbutt, executive member for corporate resources at Northumberland County Council, said: “We categorically disagree with Mr Opperman’s assertions.

“Academies are bodies established and funded by central Government over which the county council has no control, but which nevertheless still have staff participating in the pension fund.

“The county council has sought assurances from the Department for Education that it, as the body responsible for the academy programme, would take over responsibility for any outstanding pension deficit liabilities of an academy.

“So far, central Government has not agreed to meet such obligations for academies.”