In May 2010 Education Secretary of State, Michael Gove wrote to all local authorities inviting them to join him in dialogue about how to make his vision for a new school system a reality. Subsequently, at the Local Government Association conference in 2010, the Secretary of State announced his intention to establish a Ministerial Advisory Group to consider the role of the local authority in relation to education and children’s services – “to enable dialogue between ministers and local authorities to consider all such issues, in partnership between central and local Government”.
At its meeting on 14 July 2011 the Ministerial Advisory Group (MAG) decided to commission a focussed project to research what LAs were already doing to adapt to a situation where they were increasingly becoming “commissioners” of schools and services to schools rather than providers in their own right. The project is known as the “Local Authority Action Research (LAAR)” project.
The LAAR group presented its interim report to the Ministerial Advisory Group in February 2012. The group’s work is continuing into a second phase.
Information about this highly significant work can be found on the Department of Education’s website at www.education.gov.uk/childrenandyoungpeople/strategy/b00203604/maglaarsg