Labour will scrap the free schools programme and end academisation, the shadow education secretary has announced, as she unveiled proposals to shake up the sector.

Angela Rayner said she would allow academies to return to local authority control and vowed to put a stop to the “fat cat” salaries of some executives at large academy chains if her party came to power.

She said Labour would “immediately” end the Tories’ academy and free schools programmes, saying they “neither improve standards nor empower staff or parents”.

Instead, Ms Rayner pledged to bring all publicly funded schools back into the mainstream public sector, with a “common rulebook and under local democratic control”.

In a warmly-received address at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool, the frontbencher also announced plans to introduce a new national Substitute Teacher Register to end the “spiralling cost” to schools of hiring supply teachers.

Ms Rayner said: “At a time when our schools have to ask parents to give extra money for books and classroom essentials, it’s crazy we’re spending half a billion pounds a year just on agency fees. That money should be spent on teachers and the badly needed resources our children need to get a world class education, and under a Labour government it would.

“Our straightforward, simple and proven policy will save hundreds of millions of pounds a year and help schools find the talented teachers they need. While the Tories obsess over damaging and unnecessary changes to the education system, Labour will keep on producing sensible policies that will save our schools money and give our kids a better education.”

She told delegates that Labour’s proposal to create a National Education Service was about both educating and empowering people.

She said it would not only “reverse the cuts but tackle the inefficiency of the Tories’ school system and take power from corporations and hand it to communities”.

“We’ll start by immediately ending the Tories’ academy and free schools programmes. They neither improve standards nor empower staff or parents. Instead, they’ve been shut out and cut out by Tory ministers in Whitehall.”

Angela Rayner at Annual Conference 2018

Angela Rayner is now LIVE at Annual Conference, with our plan for education. Watch along at home 👇

Posted by The Labour Party on Monday, September 24, 2018

Ms Rayner, who received a standing ovation for her speech, criticised the current academy system in which councillors are “left responsible for school places but without the power to create them”.

“So we will allow them to build schools, create new places and take back control of admissions from academy trusts.

“We’ll also tackle the problem of trusts that fail, leaving schools stranded outside the system. Imagine being in an organisation facing a crisis but with no leadership or direction. You’d think Tory ministers would know the feeling,” she said.

“Yet that’s what they’ve inflicted on an ever increasing number of schools. So we’ll allow academies to return to local authority control.

“We’ll end the scandal of individuals and companies profiting from schools they are involved in, stopping fat cat pay for bosses and restoring fair pay for staff.”

Dr Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, welcomed the speech, saying: “The commitment by Labour to curtail the academies and free schools programmes and to give the role of providing school places and building new schools back to local authorities will be welcomed up and down the country by the many parents, carers, teachers and school staff who have been failed by the current system.”