Blimey, now that is a cynical view. Local Authorities usually have a wealth of experienced educational professionals on their teams, be it ex-head teachers, teaching consultants, specialist educational needs providers etc. etc. Surely the budget line is exactly all that each academy will be seen...
It is a positive for that individual school. The government can make the academy model look great because it can chuck money at shiny new examples. It obviously can't do that for every school though. The obvious question is why does it take academy status for the government to provide capital...
We're now starting to see some longer term data from this 'academy' project, and there is nothing to suggest it improves education or results in anyway. In fact in many cases it is the academies that are struggling.