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The aim of tailored reviews is to provide a challenge of arm’s length bodies (ALBs), to ensure that they are fit for purpose and are offering value for taxpayer’s money by assessing the ongoing need for ALBs and scrutinising a number of areas.

This tailored review builds on previous work that established the Teaching Regulation Agency in 2018, and provided an opportunity to consider how the agency is meeting its objectives for regulating the teaching profession in England.

Tailored Review Report on the Teaching Regulation Agency August 2020 2 Contents Foreword 3 Executive Summary 3 Summary of conclusions 4 Summary of recommendations 5 Introduction 8 Objectives of establishing the TRA 10 An assessment of the form and functions of the TRA 12 Governance arrangements 16 Relationship with the Department 21 Performance of the TRA 23 Efficiency savings 29 Other considerations 31 Annex 34 3 Foreword The Teaching Regulation Agency was established in 2018 to support schools, head teachers and employers with safeguarding responsibilities. The agency is responsible for taking action on allegations of serious teacher misconduct and supporting employers to complete pre-recruitment checks to ensure they employ appropriately qualified teachers. Proportionate and effective regulation is vital for ensuring that schools and parents can have confidence in the teaching profession, as part of our commitment to ensuring high standards in all schools. The Department for Education and its arm’s length bodies must work together with a shared understanding of purpose, outcomes and accountability. This review has provided the opportunity to consider this relationship. It also considered whether the initial objectives of establishing the agency have been achieved. I was pleased to note that the report concludes that the main objectives established during the set up of the agency have been achieved. The review also makes recommendations to further strengthen the work of the agency. This includes seeking and acting on customer and stakeholder feedback to improve its service and learning from other regulators on how best to measure performance. I endorse these proposals, alongside all findings and conclusions of the report. I would like to thank all those who contributed to the review, especially the CEO, Alan Meyrick, and all his staff for their collaboration with the review team. Nick Gibb Minister of State for School Standards 4 Executive Summary The findings from this tailored review highlight the importance and continuing need for the Teaching Regulation Agency (TRA), which maintains the regulation of the teaching profession, and acts as the competent authority for teaching in England on behalf of the Secretary of State for Education. Since it was established in 2018, the TRA has fulfilled a significant purpose in supporting schools and head teachers with safeguarding responsibilities, helping to ensure that schools employ teachers that are suitably qualified for their role, and by taking action on receipt of allegations of serious teacher misconduct. The tailored review team recognises the high level of scrutiny that the TRA has undergone since its establishment, following the dissolution of the National College of Teaching and Leadership (NCTL), and the repurposing of the NCTL’s statutory functions through TRA’s Teacher Qualification Unit (TQU) and Teacher Misconduct Unit (TMU). This tailored review builds on the extensive work already undertaken by the Government Internal Audit Agency (GIAA), the National Audit Office (NAO), and the Department for Education (DfE), and acknowledges the continuous efforts of the Agency in working to achieve its objectives. This tailored review report makes recommendations with a view to enabling the TRA to further strengthen its governance and operational resilience. Summary of conclusions Form and function Overall, the main objectives of establishing the TRA have been achieved. The review identified a clear need for the functions of the TRA to remain at arm’s length from the core of the Department as an Executive Agency. Conclusion 1: Overall, the main objectives in establishing the TRA have been achieved. Conclusion 2: The TRA should remain as an Executive Agency, and continue to be sponsored by the DfE. Conclusion 3: The functions of the TRA are appropriate in enabling it to meet its current purpose and objectives. Governance and Relationship with Department The TRA’s governance arrangements are effective and proportionate to the size and scope of the organisation. Overall, there is a constructive relationship between the TRA and the Department, offering effective support and challenge. Conclusion 4: The TRA’s governance arrangements are proportionate and effective for the size and scope of the organisation. 5 Conclusion 5: The TRA has made a concerted effort to manage operational risk effectively and move towards working with the Department’s Risk Management Framework. Conclusion 6: The relationship between the Senior Sponsor and the TRA is positive and effective, offering appropriate support and challenge. Conclusion 7: Close working between the TRA and the DfE policy colleagues is adding value to the operation of teacher regulation by bringing together the relationship between policy (underpinning the regulation of the teaching profession) and delivery (through the TRA’s Teacher Misconduct Unit and Teacher Qualification Unit). Effectiveness and Efficiency Overall, the review found that the TRA continues to make positive improvements to increase its effectiveness and efficiency in the regulation of the teaching profession on behalf of the Secretary of State for Education. Conclusion 8: The TRA has made positive improvements in the handling of Teacher Misconduct casework by implementing a new case management system with increased management information, reconfiguring resource, creating a new quality assurance framework and implementing additional contract management activities. Conclusion 9: The TRA currently takes a suitably robust approach to contract and panellist management. Conclusion 10: As a small organisation of approximately 76 staff, the TRA already uses the most efficient approach to accessing shared services. The use of office space at Cheylesmore House for hearings has the potential to generate future savings. Summary of recommendations Strengthening Governance The TRA is underpinned by proportionate governance arrangements commensurate with the small size and specific scope of the agency and consistent with the accountability and financial risk held within the organisation. The review team has made recommendations to enable the TRA to strengthen its governance and internal controls further by increasing the effectiveness of strategic meetings and continuing to highlight the importance of managing risk. Recommendation 1: The TRA should strengthen its governance and internal controls by: reviewing the appropriateness of the full balance scorecard as a strategic tool; ensuring a stable and continued attendance from key representatives at both Strategic Performance Review and Executive Board meetings; and holding a discussion with the Department’s 6 lead Non Executive Board member for ALBs to consider whether there are additional opportunities for support and challenge, proportionate to the TRA’s needs. Recommendation 2: To ensure that risks are appropriately identified, owned and controlled, particularly when they may be relevant to both the Department and the TRA, it is important that the TRA continues to work to highlight the importance of managing risk, and to ensure that risk ownership and accountabilities are understood and appropriate contingency action is taken. As good practice the Executive team should continue to strengthen its approach to risk management by seeking guidance from the Department and broaden its view of the risk landscape by regularly attending the Department’s Arm’s Length Body Risk Network. Organisational resilience and staffing In order to strengthen the TRA’s organisational resilience, the report has identified a number of areas where an increased level of strategic Human Resources (HR) support would be beneficial to improve staff retention and succession planning, in light of the people challenges faced. Recommendation 3: The Department’s HR should support the TRA in exploring ways to increase both its decision making resilience and succession planning at a senior level. Recommendation 4: The TRA should seek additional HR support from the Department to tackle ongoing recruitment and retention challenges across the organisation, e.g. by introducing flexible resourcing options, career pathways and succession planning. The TRA could also work with staff to identify additional options for staff wellbeing, given the nature of the casework, including promoting the services of mental health first aiders or the Employee Assistance Programme. Performance and effectiveness Following on from previous reviews, the TRA has made continuous efforts to improve performance. As a relatively new organisation the benefits of the TRA’s continuous improvement work is not yet demonstratable in the TRA’s reporting, which may impact stakeholders’ perception of progress. The report highlights a number of recommendations to enable the TRA to: review and measure performance effectively; demonstrate the impact of improvement activities; engage stakeholders and build on its performance to ensure a user centred approach. Recommendation 5: The TRA’s staffing structures should be reviewed every 6 months starting in April 2020 to ensure it is achieving the outcomes intended, as new systems embed and work activities continue to change. This would also present an opportunity to reflect whether any work could move away from time intensive manual processes. 7 Recommendation 6: The TRA should use existing stakeholder meetings, for example with DfE policy colleagues, trade unions and panellists, to listen to feedback, to share activity undertaken to improve its performance and to demonstrate progress in its service improvements. This would be further strengthened if the TRA articulated and shared the future benefits it expects to see from its casework improvement activities and put in place mea