Background
Under Sections 24, 25 and 26 of the Education Act 2002, governing bodies of maintained schools are able to collaborate in different ways, ranging from joint committees and joint governing-body meetings to federation under a single governing body. The regulations on federation and collaboration enable closer collaboration between schools and are part of the Government’s thrust to increase freedoms and flexibilities, and encourage joint working between providers of education. These provisions apply to maintained schools only (although less formal arrangements continue to be possible that may include non-maintained schools and FE institutions).
 
Responsibilities
In the case of both federation and collaboration, it is for the existing governing bodies to decide whether they wish to take up these options, and to carry out the necessary procedures. For federations of fewer than six schools, the Secretary of State (and DCSF officials) have no role in the procedure (unless there is an appeal under general provisions that procedures have not been carried out correctly). If any schools wish to form a formal statutory federation of more than five schools, they will need to submit a proposal to the Secretary of State under the Power to Innovate.

The federation regulations provide that schools wishing to federate must first consult interested parties in the area, including parents, staff at the schools, and the local authority (LA). The consultation documents are required to specify the schools involved and the proposed date of federation, the proposed size of the governing body, the proposed numbers of each stakeholder group, the proposed arrangements for staffing (i.e. whether there will be a headteacher of more than one school, whether other staff will work at more than one school), and other details.
The constitution of a federated governing body reflects the stakeholder model applying to individual governing bodies, so that any group that would have been represented on the governing bodies of the individual schools will be represented on the governing body of the federation. Stakeholder groups are parents, staff, LA governors, community governors and, for voluntary schools, foundation governors.

These regulations do not include federations involving voluntary-aided or foundation schools; these categories will be dealt with in further regulations (this is because much more complex detail will be needed about transfer of property and staffing, particularly in schools with a religious character).

Guidance on the federation regulations can be downloaded from 'Attachments' below. The regulations (SI 2004 No. 2042) are available on the OPSI website. The Standards Site also provides information on federations.

The collaboration regulations leave as much as possible of the detailed arrangements to the schools concerned. They permit two or more governing bodies to arrange for any of their functions to be discharged jointly, and for the discharge of any of their functions that may be delegated to a single committee, to be delegated to a joint committee. The specific procedures (on clerking and membership of committees, for example) generally mirror those for individual schools.

Guidance on the collaboration regulations can be downloaded from 'Attachments' below.  The regulations (SI 2003 No. 1962) can be accessed via the GovernorNet article in 'Further reading' below.

Chapter 21 of the Guide to the Law provides a range of information on collaboration and federation.  Follow the link in 'Background reading' below.