ABSTRACT
The governors of Moortown School resigned suffering from stress. This fictitious newspaper extract summarises some of the worst predictions about financial management made in the late 1980s. Moortown School's replacement governing body determined to avoid the same mistakes by working through the following agenda. Moortown's governors decided to underline those activities in which they felt governors should be involved. Moortown, like all maintained and GMS schools, can allocate its income as the school chooses amongst staff, equipment, books, maintenance, insurance etc. The whole governing body of Moortown needed to be involved in reviewing, at the end of the year, whether or not the money spent had achieved what the school's development plan intended. Spotting fraud, corruption and creative accounting are activities for professionals. Governors are not personally financially liable and are usually covered by insurance indemnifying them, for example, against negligence, against damages for libel and slander and against theft, fraud or embezzlement by school employees.
