THE cost of schools becoming academies has the potential to bankrupt Bradford Council, education boss Imran Khan has warned.

And the National Union of Teachers has described it as a “timebomb that’s ticking under the council”.

Failing local authority schools are often forced to become academies and under Department for Education rules, any debts held by the schools remain with the council when they convert.

But if the schools have surplus money, they take the cash with them.

Local authorities are also expected to pick up the tab for other costs of conversion, which can amount to £30,000 to £40,000 each time, according to the union.

Councillor Khan, Bradford Council’s executive member for education, said: “If enough schools with big deficits convert it could potentially bankrupt the council, so we have to find ways of dealing with this issue.

“We have to remember that the most important thing is that our children get the best education.”

Cllr Khan (Lab) has previously warned that the total cost of academy conversions could leave the authority up to £25 million out of pocket.

He has now called for the council to get financial support to deal with this burden.

He told a meeting of the cross-party children’s services overview and scrutiny committee that he was planning to meet with Regional Schools Commissioner Vicky Beer this month, and would be raising the issue with her.

He told the committee: “We have to get the message back to central government that we shouldn’t be dealing with this without financial support.”

Stuart McKinnon-Evans, director of finance at the council, said: “I would caution using words like bankrupt, but I can see the point that the costs to the council could be very high.

“In no other part of government policy would anyone agree to something without knowing the financial consequences.”

Councillor Dale Smith (Con), chairman of the committee, said: “With academy conversions I worry that we are giving them an invitation to spend as much as they like, with all the financial fallout falling to the council.

“That doesn’t sound like good business or good value to the taxpayer.”

Judith Kirk, deputy director of education, said: “I don’t know if there is an answer for this. We just have to work with what is presented to us.

“In 30 years of being involved in education, this is the most challenging time.”

The NUT’s Bradford spokesman Ian Murch told the Telegraph & Argus it was “a very serious issue” and called for the Government to reimburse councils for the costs they were facing.

“No-one gives the council any budget for this, so it’s a timebomb that’s ticking under the council,” he said.

“It’s a big problem because what the Government tries to do is it will force a school that is doing badly to be taken over by somebody and it doesn’t want those people to have to meet the debts, because otherwise they wouldn’t take it over.

“But they have no particular evidence that when they do take failing schools over that it gets any better.”

The Department for Education has strongly defended the arrangement, saying councils had a duty to make sure schools did not build up debts in the first place.

A spokesman said: “We work closely with local authorities to support academy conversions. It is right, however, that councils are required to cover deficits accumulated while schools are under their control.

“It is important that local authorities take action to ensure their schools are financially viable and act promptly to address any deficits.”

He said it was also appropriate that taxpayers’ money which had been given to schools to educate children stayed with them if it hadn’t yet been spent.

But Mr Murch said it was a “misleading presumption” that the council was responsible for racking up school debts.

He gave the example of Hanson School in Swain House - which is converting to an academy and may face a deficit of almost £2.7 million by the end of the financial year - saying this had been a foundation school so wasn’t owned by the council.