Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con) I beg to move, That this House has
considered school attendance. It is a delight to serve under your
chairmanship, Mr Twigg, and thank you for giving us the opportunity
to discuss school attendance in this Chamber. I note that a very
similar debate is happening in the main Chamber—excuse me for
having run from there to here. I understand that that is an
extremely unusual occurrence, and Mr Deputy Speaker could not
reflect on a time in...Request free
trial
(Chelmsford) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered school attendance.
It is a delight to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg, and
thank you for giving us the opportunity to discuss school
attendance in this Chamber. I note that a very similar debate is
happening in the main Chamber—excuse me for having run from there
to here. I understand that that is an extremely unusual
occurrence, and Mr Deputy Speaker could not reflect on a time in
21 years when two debates on an identical issue had been tabled
in both Chambers at once. Mine was tabled first!
A great deal has been written about school attendance recently.
People are right to be concerned, with the number of severely
absent or persistently absent pupils having soared since the
pandemic. Last spring, nearly 1.5 million children were
persistently absent from school, which means that nearly one in
five children is missing 10% or more of their school time—the
equivalent to an afternoon or more of every week of school.
Education is key to giving young people access to skills and
opportunities in their future, and the sudden surge in persistent
and severe absences risks a profound impact on educational
attainment and longer-term outcomes. That is why, before
Christmas, I tabled a Bill to tackle the issue.
We should be extraordinarily proud of our nation’s young people.
Children in England now rank 11th in the world for maths and 13th
for reading. Back in 2010, when today’s school leavers were just
starting out in reception, the same league tables placed that
cohort of children 27th for maths and 25th for reading. There has
been phenomenal progress in children’s school journeys over those
14 years, and we must not let that slip.
The reasons for increased levels of pupil absence are multiple
and complex. They include issues such as support for those with
special educational needs and disabilities, anxiety and mental
health. We know, for example, that if a child’s SEND needs are
unmet, that can lead to them missing out on education. I am also
concerned about the rise in children being put on part-time
timetables, especially children with SEND who may not yet have an
education, health and care plan—part-time timetables should be
used only for a very short time and in exceptional
circumstances.
Changes in attitudes towards minor ailments may be another
driving force behind school absences. Parents are now more likely
to keep their children at home for minor illnesses such as coughs
and colds than before the pandemic. In most cases, children are
better off in school, including when they have minor ailments.
There may be other changing societal issues. For example, a
mental health services provider in my constituency suggested to
me that increasingly addictive online gaming is impacting
negatively on mental health and resulting in more of the children
and young people they see missing out on school. I would like to
see more research on that to see whether those societal issues
are also driving some of the change.
For the most vulnerable pupils, regular attendance is also an
important protective factor. Research shows that regular absence
from school can expose young people to other harms, such as being
drawn into crime or serious violence. The Education Committee
heard that children missing out on school was one of the biggest
risk factors in cases of child exploitation. These are yet more
reasons why we must find new ways to bring those who are missing
out back to school and ensure that young people turn up to
class.
Every parent has a legal responsibility to ensure that their
child receives an education. If they decide to have their child
registered at school, they have a legal duty to ensure their
child attends that school regularly. However, in addressing the
issue of school attendance, it is important that we do not simply
lay the blame at the door of hard-working parents. Most parents
want their children to do well, but many need help to support
their children to fulfil those aspirations. Securing good
attendance requires a holistic approach—an approach that brings
together schools, families, the local authority and other local
partners.
Much detailed work has already been undertaken. In 2022,
following a detailed consultation, the Department for Education
published new guidance entitled, “Working together to improve
school attendance”. Running to more than 60 pages, it is
extremely detailed, with a great deal of emphasis placed on early
help and multidisciplinary support. It requires every school to
have a senior member of the school’s leadership team acting as an
attendance champion and sets out how schools and other partners
should work together.
Last year, the Education Committee undertook a detailed inquiry
on attendance. Witnesses agreed that that guidance needed to be
put on a statutory footing, and that was a major recommendation
of the Committee. Making it mandatory for bodies to follow that
best practice is supported by the Children’s Commissioner and the
Centre for Social Justice, as well as the Education Committee and
many other experts.
That is why, before Christmas, I presented a private Member’s
Bill to the House of Commons to make that happen, the School
Attendance (Duties of Local Authorities and Proprietors of
Schools) Bill. It will make the guidance statutory so that all
schools, trusts, local authorities and other relevant local
partners must follow it. The Bill will contain two clauses. The
first will introduce a new general duty on local authorities to
exercise their functions with a view to promoting regular
attendance and reducing absence in their areas. The second will
require schools of all types to have and publicise a school
attendance policy. Both clauses will require all schools and
local authorities to have regard to guidance issued by the
Secretary of State. That will all be achieved by inserting two
clauses into the Education Act 1996, under section 443.
Incidentally, I have given copies of the wording of that Bill to
the Public Bill Office today. It will be printed overnight and
will be available for Members to read tomorrow. The DFE has also
told me that it will publish a revised version of the guidance
ahead of the new provisions taking effect, and that the guidance
will help to reduce unfairness in the amount of support available
for families in different areas of the country and level up
standards in areas with poorer attendance by providing consistent
access to support.
Local authorities will need to provide all schools with a named
point of contact for support with queries and advice. They will
need to meet each school termly to discuss cases where
multi-agency support is needed, work with other agencies to
provide that support where it is needed in cases of persistent or
severe absence, use their services and levers to remove common
causes of absence in their areas, and monitor and improve the
attendance of children with a social worker.
(Strangford) (DUP)
I commend the right hon. Lady for bringing forward this important
subject for debate. I know that there could be no better person
than the Minister to answer the points that she is putting
forward. Does the right hon. Lady not agree that the mixed
messages over covid about learning from home have left a lot more
parents either more complacent about attendance or expecting
teachers to provide online learning to help their children catch
up? There is no substitute for in-school learning; I think that
the right hon. Lady said that, and I agree with her. Teachers
cannot be expected to double their prep and delivery on behalf of
those children whose parents keep them off and ask for the
learning to take place on their schedule. Does the right hon.
Lady agree?
I think that the important message to get to children and their
families is that the best place for most children to be is in
school. That is best for their education. It is best for their
friendships. It is best for their development. It is best for
their learning in other extracurricular activities. There is also
a separate issue of home education, which I will get to
shortly.
Under my Bill, which makes the guidance mandatory, schools will
be expected to have an attendance champion, to have robust
day-to-day processes for recording, monitoring and following up
absences, to use their attendance data to prioritise the pupils
and cohorts on which to focus their efforts, and to work jointly
with their local authorities and other agencies where the causes
of persistent and severe absence go beyond a school’s remit.
The Local Government Association, for which I have great respect,
has written to me in advance of the debate, saying that there is
urgent need for a cross-government, child-centred strategy to
tackle rising disadvantage and the wider factors that contribute
towards persistent-absence children missing out on school. It
says that that must include reforming the SEND system, expanding
access to mental health support and youth services, connecting
with hard-to-reach communities and ensuring that schools are
resourced, supported and incentivised. The LGA also supports the
introduction of a register of children who are out of school due
to elective home education. That would improve the data on the
visibility of these children so that councils can verify that
children are receiving a suitable education in a safe
environment.
A register of children who are out of school due to elective home
education is not part of my Bill, but it is part of a Bill tabled
before Christmas by my hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley
(Mrs Drummond), who is a former Ofsted inspector and just spoke
in the debate in the main Chamber. I know that Government
Ministers are assisting her with the Bill; it is on the Order
Paper and has been since December. It does not need to be
overtaken by an Opposition day debate to table yet another Bill,
because that would be confusing. We have two Bills, they are
going through the House, and they are already on the Order
Paper.
The Centre for Mental Health and the Children and Young People’s
Mental Health Coalition have written to me to point out the link
between mental health and absence from school that I have
mentioned. They recommend that a mental health absence code is
introduced. The issue of different absence codes was also raised
by the Education Committee. It is not specifically addressed by
my Bill, but the Minister may wish to comment on it. In their
letter, they welcomed the “laudable progress” being made in
rolling out mental health support teams to many thousands of
schools. They would like its funding to be guaranteed and an
assurance that all schools will have access to these teams. It
would be helpful if the Minister could address that in his
answers to the debate.
(Upper Bann) (DUP)
Having been born and brought up in her early years in Northern
Ireland, the right hon. Member will know of the excellent
educational facilities and teaching in that part of the United
Kingdom. She makes a valid point about mental health. She will
know that one in eight young people in Northern Ireland
experience anxiety, which is 25% higher than in the rest of the
UK. Does she agree that there needs to be a focus across the
United Kingdom on mental health because it is contributing to
children’s absence from school?
I thank the hon. Member for her comments. I remember my time in
education in Northern Ireland very fondly. I was lucky to have
access to a brilliant education in both state and private schools
and to benefit from scholarships. I have excellent schools in my
Chelmsford constituency. I commend the Government for the
increase in recent years in the number of good and outstanding
schools across the country.
On mental health, the Schools Minister has just explained in the
main Chamber how the mental health support teams have been rolled
out already to thousands of schools, and that they are working
with the NHS to see that rolled out more widely. That is already
in progress, and I have asked the Minister to address more of
that roll-out. I know that it makes a difference, and it was a
major ask from the coalitions of mental health experts who wrote
to me. There is also, often, bespoke local need, such as that
addressed by the amazing Kids Inspire charity in Essex, based in
my constituency of Chelmsford, which does wonderful work. Part of
it is funded by the voluntary sector, and part of it is state
funded through grants. It does fantastic work with children who
have been at risk of trauma.
I say to the hon. Member for Upper Bann () that it breaks my heart
that Stormont is not sitting. If it were, Northern Ireland would
be able to make its own decisions to address the particular
mental health and other health needs there.
I thank the Centre for Social Justice for all its research on the
subject, and the Children’s Commissioner and her team for their
research and advice. As well as listening to the views of
colleagues today, I have been working with the Children’s
Commissioner, who is helping me to host a major roundtable next
week so that I can hear the views of schools, social workers,
parents and other expert groups directly. That will happen before
my Bill has its Second Reading on Friday 2 February. I hope that
the Bill will receive cross-party support from all Members in the
Chamber and that they will ensure the same from other Members of
their parties, which will enable it to pass swiftly through
Second Reading and into Committee. Through that, we can make the
guidance mandatory so that every school, local authority and body
follow best practice. It is a positive legal step that we can
take to enable children to get the support they need and help
them return to school.
4.45pm
(City of Durham) (Lab)
I thank the right hon. Member for Chelmsford () for securing the debate. I was
unable to attend the Labour Opposition day debate on a similar
theme, so I appreciate being able to raise my points here. School
absences are a huge problem, and we all agree with that. In
County Durham, there were well over 1,000 absences in the 2022-23
autumn and spring terms. That number has sharply risen since the
2016-17 autumn and spring terms, when there were under 250
absences in the county. The Labour party estimates that the
number of absences will rise to well over 1,800 by the 2026-27
autumn and spring terms, which would be an increase of
377%—unless, of course, there is a change of policy or, better
yet, a change of Government.
(Bradford South) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does she agree that
we need a coherent strategy for tackling persistent absence,
which includes a new register for home schooling, to keep track
of these absent pupils?
I absolutely agree. All children, whether they are in mainstream
schooling or not, deserve to have the same importance placed on
their education and their life chances. In Durham, we are blessed
with incredible educators, and I must mention Mr Byers of
Framwellgate School Durham, who publicly shared his recent letter
to families highlighting the importance of good attendance. Mr
Byers also encouraged families to reach out for support if they
were struggling with their children. We must remember that
support is key to ensuring that children achieve all that they
are capable of, and I will miss Mr Byers’s supportive attitude
when he sadly leaves Fram School in the near future.
It would be remiss of me not to mention St Leonard’s Catholic
School in my constituency, and I am sure that Members will
appreciate that my constituents, especially those affected at St
Leonard’s, will want me to use all available opportunities to
raise what their children are going through—after all, that is
what they sent me here to do when they elected me in 2019. St
Leonard’s was ordered to close just days before the autumn term
began last year because of the presence of reinforced autoclaved
aerated concrete. According to the Government’s own figures,
pupils at St Leonard’s only moved back to full-face education
learning at the end of November. Before that, they were in a mix
of face-to-face and remote arrangements, and for almost two weeks
in fully remote learning.
I want to focus on that because, for the weeks that pupils were
not in school, they were unable to socialise or receive a
face-to-education, and they were placed in a topsy-turvy
arrangement of being taught remotely and then off site. Their
education was severely disrupted and it still is—they are being
taught in inadequate settings. I would wager that the disastrous
impact of RAAC is not too dissimilar to the effect of chronic
absences. Absences can severely affect a pupil’s future
opportunities—just look at the situation at St Leonard’s—and the
Department for Education has not offered any dispensations. In
fact, Durham University said the following in a report released
last week:
“No policy has yet been devised to protect the results of the
exam cohorts most affected. It is not clear why”.
My first question is this: why has a policy not been written up?
In a letter that I sent to the Department for Education in
October, I suggested an amendment to the Apprenticeships, Skills,
Children and Learning Act 2009 to give the Secretary of State the
powers to give dispensations where appropriate. Why not start
with that? I cannot be more emphatic about this point: parents,
teachers and pupils are extremely worried that pupils will not be
achieve their dream of getting into the university of their
choice because the Government have not offered to help them. When
will the Government offer to help them?
With the crisis in St Leonard’s school, we can see how other
injustices, such as the situation with Royal Mail, have been able
to run away with themselves in this place. Government Ministers,
such as the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (), could have solved that problem; they could have
brought justice for those affected. Instead, there was inaction
and indifference. What are the consequences? The people out
there—the people who we are supposed to serve—are left all the
worse off. I will not allow that to happen to my
constituents.
4.50pm
(The Cotswolds)
(Con)
Mr Twigg, I am grateful to serve under your chairmanship, and I
congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford
() not only on securing this
debate but on her excellent speech.
I attended the SEND Reform England event last week, which was a
great opportunity to speak to specialists in the area. Its
manifesto, which was circulated at the event, says that 24% of
identified SEND pupils have an education, health and care plan,
or EHCP, which meant 390,000 pupils in 2023. Additionally, it
reports that 97% of school leaders think that funding for all
SEND pupils is insufficient and 95% think that funding is
insufficient for pupils with an EHCP.
During the covid period, I had weekly online meetings with county
leaders and my fellow Gloucestershire MPs in which the challenges
facing schools were often discussed. There was huge concern about
some students dropping out of the system, not engaging with
online learning through the lockdown period and not returning to
schools when they fully reopened.
The hon. Member for City of Durham () referred to a school in
her constituency being closed through RAAC, which I sympathise
with. Of course that situation—of school closure—applied to
pupils across the entire United Kingdom when their schools were
closed during covid, so I think we are all very familiar with the
effects of schools being closed. Nevertheless, as I say, I
sympathise with what happened in that school.
The overall absence rate for primary and secondary schools in
Gloucestershire during the autumn term of 2022-23 was 7.3%. That
compares with a 6.6% absence rate for the autumn term of 2021.
Before the pandemic, the rate was consistently below 5%. This
pattern of increased absence since the pandemic can be seen in
national, statistical neighbour, and south-west groupings.
According to the Government website, across England in both the
autumn and spring terms of 2022-23, the overall absence rate was
7.3%, with 21.2% of pupils being persistently absent across those
terms, meaning that they missed 10% of sessions or more—an
exceptionally high percentage of students missing classes.
I, too, listened to the Minister for Schools, my right hon.
Friend the Member for East Hampshire (), addressing the Chamber. He
made the point that the data for persistent absenteeism will be
published this Thursday. We do not know what that data will show;
hopefully, it will show an improved situation.
Of course, pupils being persistently absent from school has a
huge impact on their academic success, with just 11.3% of
severely absent pupils achieving grades 9 to 4-4 being the pass
grade—in English and maths, compared with 67.6% of all pupils.
Although we cannot look totally at statistics in this debate, we
can look at the social and mental impact of absenteeism on these
pupils. As other Members, particularly my right hon. Friend the
Member for Chelmsford, have already said, I believe that being
persistently absent from school will have similarly negative
impacts on other aspects of a young person’s life.
I totally agree not only with what my right hon. Friend the
Minister for Schools said in the main Chamber, but with my right
hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford. School is the best place
to be to learn. For social development, for making friendships,
and for overall physical development, it is much better that
children are in school, rather than being absent.
During covid, I saw a considerable increase in casework on this
issue, which sadly has continued in the years since. I am talking
about parents getting in touch with me about children who are
long-term absent from school, and asking me to help them to
engage with schools on how to move forward with their children’s
education. Those cases were usually exacerbated by complex mental
health issues and educational needs that made regular attendance
more challenging. In liaising with parents and schools, it became
clear that the relationship had completely broken down in many
cases, with the students being the ones to ultimately suffer.
Teachers were being overextended on what they could achieve.
Understandably, with the pressures of trying to teach during
lockdowns, they simply did not have the capacity to provide the
extensive support needed by some pupils, while parents felt
overwhelmed in dealing with their children’s educational needs
without support.
Ultimately, as my right hon. Friend said, the legal
responsibility for pupils attending school falls on the parents.
Unfortunately, because of often complicated socioeconomic factors
and individual family challenges, a considerable number of
families are simply unable or unwilling to engage fully with
their children’s educational needs. We should not allow those
children to fall out of the education system. I agree with my
right hon. Friend and others and, indeed, the Minister for
Schools, who said in the main Chamber that we should have a
compulsory register for home education, so that we can see
whether children are being educated at home or whether they are
absent from school, and then we can take the necessary measures
to do something about it.
Growing demand for mental health services and SEND support
centres creates additional pressure, compounding a problem that
became far worse during the lockdown period. The Education
Committee examined this problem, launching its inquiry into
persistent absence and support for disadvantaged pupils in
January 2023. Another report, published in September, made a
number of recommendations, including a review and possible
abolition of fines, which it found made little or no impact on
long-term absenteeism, the urgent need to improve school-level
attendance monitoring, and the need for investment in SEND and
child and adolescent mental health services—CAMHS—which it
concluded are significant factors in the attendance crisis.
The Government are increasing the direct support offered to
children and their families with the expansion of the attendance
mentor pilot programme. With an investment of up to £15 million
over three years, that programme will provide direct, intensive
support to more than 10,000 persistent and severely absent pupils
and their families. I think that the Minister for Schools said in
the main Chamber where it is being expanded to, and I am pretty
sure that I heard that it is expanding to the area of the hon.
Member for City of Durham, but she will no doubt correct me if
that is wrong.
The Government have also produced a toolkit for schools,
providing tips and evidence-based, adaptable templates for
communicating with parents and carers, as well as the plan
announced last year to expand attendance hubs, delivering 18 new
hubs. This is a knowledge and practice-exchange initiative,
taking the lead from those schools with excellent attendance
records to introduce engagement initiatives such as breakfast
clubs and extracurricular activities or to improve an individual
school’s attendance data. I have just listened to the Minister
for Schools outline a compendium of measures to help pupils to
return to school.
On a county level—
(in the Chair)
Order. The sitting is suspended for 15 minutes.
4.58pm
Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.
5.13pm
On resuming—
(in the Chair)
The debate may continue until 5.45 pm.
I am grateful for your forbearance, Mr Twigg, given the debate in
the main Chamber, and I am delighted to be able to resume my
speech.
Just to quickly recap the last bit of my speech, before we had to
suspend the sitting I was praising the Government for their
attendance monitoring pilot programmes and particularly for
delivering 18 new attendance hubs, which are doing much of what
the private Member’s Bill introduced by my right hon. Friend the
Member for Chelmsford () aims to do, disseminating best
practice among all the agencies, and teachers and
parents—everybody involved—to try and deal with the problem of
absenteeism. I therefore wholly support her Bill.
At county level, Gloucestershire County Council provides support,
advice and guidance for schools through the team of inclusion
officers. This includes a specialist attendance officer who can
support more targeted intervention work where needed. Leveraging
technology to improve engagement and accessibility is also
essential. Online learning platforms, digital resources and
interactive teaching methods can cater to diverse learning styles
and help to ensure that students remain connected to their
studies, even in challenging circumstances that prevent them from
attending in person.
As I and so many others have said, it is vital we do not allow
students to be left behind. Regardless of how complex the reasons
for long-term absence on an individual level, all children
deserve a chance to have the educational, social and physical
opportunities that schools have to offer. From my constituency
cases, it is clear that many parents need the additional support
of schools and others to assist with their children staying in
education. By investing in early intervention, mental health
support, addressing socioeconomic disparities and embracing
technological advancements, we can all work towards creating an
education system that is inclusive, supportive and ensures that
every child has the opportunity to realise their full
potential.
On Friday, I visited Andoversford Primary School in my
constituency to speak to the headteacher about the challenges
facing the school. It was an excellent visit and a good chance to
speak to teachers, pupils and parents. While the Government have
announced record funding for schools, with The Cotswolds in
particular set to benefit from an increase of £1.5 million in
2024-25 compared with 2023-24, it is important to see what is
happening on the ground in schools.
The headteacher I met had enough money for her basic teaching.
Yet she made the point that in a small rural school, there was
very little money left for the other things, such as cleaning,
maintenance, the caretaker and the administrator—all the
different functions any school has to fulfil—and that a small
school with very limited money for overheads is particularly
disadvantaged in that respect. The headteacher also made the
point that concerns revolved around the number of pupils
attending the school overall—there are lots of small schools in
the area—and how small village schools often do not bring in
enough pupil funding to cover running costs and ensure they have
administrators, caretakers and cleaners.
Particularly relevant to this debate, however, the headteacher
also mentioned an increase in pupils with special educational
needs and disabilities, and she said how extremely difficult it
is to get an EHCP statement in Gloucestershire. In fact, in the
school I visited, there were no pupils with a statement at all.
Although the pressure on SEND overall is there, as a country, I
think there is a bit of postcode lottery in pupils being able to
get statements, and we need to address that.
I look forward to what the Minister has to say. In addressing the
whole problem of absenteeism, we have to work closely with the
local education authorities and the Department of Health and
Social Care to deal not only with pupils who do not have a
statement, but with others who have severe mental health
problems. That way, we can see—with increasingly better
knowledge, thank goodness—how we can help children and pupils
with those complex problems.
5.17pm
(Dulwich and West Norwood)
(Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I
congratulate the right hon. Member for Chelmsford () on bringing this important
debate and on her work in this area. I am glad to have the
opportunity to respond on behalf of the Opposition.
I am grateful to all hon. Members who have contributed today. We
have heard from my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham
() on the importance of
support for parents who struggle with their children’s
attendance. She also mentioned the impact of RAAC and the
disruption that is causing to children’s education in her
constituency. I hope she is able to meet the Minister tomorrow as
planned. We heard from the hon. Member for The Cotswolds ( ) about the impact of
persistent absence on the mental health and wellbeing of children
and young people. He also told of the impact of the lack of SEND
support on attendance and the very great difficulties that that
presents.
I know that everyone in the House will agree that one of the most
important things we can provide to children and young people
across the country is an excellent education. Education opens up
the world to them, not just in terms of jobs or training but in
discovering interests and passions and fulfilling their
aspirations. However, we cannot give children and young people
the foundation they need for later life if they are not in
school. New research from the Centre for Social Justice reveals
that more than one in four parents think that school is not
essential every day; not one in four adults but one in four
parents. That is an extremely worrying statistic.
A recent report by the Children’s Commissioner found that pupils
who are persistently absent in years 10 and 11 are half as likely
to pass five GCSEs as their peers with good attendance records.
Absence figures have reached historic levels under the
Conservatives, increasing by more than 40% since 2010. The number
of pupils severely absent has nearly trebled in the same period,
with more than 88,000 secondary school pupils missing at least
half of their education last year. School attendance should not
and must not be seen as optional, or something that can be dipped
in and out of. However, unfortunately for at least some parents
and carers, the relationship between schools, families and the
Government has broken down after years of neglect.
School attendance is one of the most urgent challenges that the
Government must tackle in the education system today. The figures
on school attendance have been moving in the wrong direction for
years. In the 2016-17 academic year, the rate of persistent
absence was 10.7%, and that has increased year on year ever since
under this Government. By 2022-23, the rate stood at 21.2%—double
that of just six years ago. It is unacceptable that the
Government have been sitting idly by, letting the rates of
persistent absence rise and giving no real thought or effort to
the solutions to tackle the issue. They must start working to get
children back in school, and they must start with urgency.
Labour has a plan to reduce persistent absence. We would
introduce free breakfast clubs for every primary school pupil in
England to boost attendance across the country. We know that
breakfast clubs improve children’s learning and development,
helping to boost performance in maths and reading, but they have
also been shown to improve behaviour and attendance. They not
only take pressure off parents in the morning but give children a
chance to play and socialise, and, importantly, make sure that no
child has to start the school day hungry. We would legislate for
a new register of home-schooled pupils to keep track of those not
in mainstream schooling. For many children, their home is a safe
and enriching learning environment, but it is right that the
Government take action to ensure that if a child is not in
school, local authorities are clear about where they are and what
education they are receiving.
My hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (Mrs Drummond) is not
present. I know that she wished to be, but she has been in the
debate in the main Chamber. Much as many of us try to be in two
places at once, that is not possible. She has a piece of
legislation already going through this House to legislate for a
register of home-educated children. Will the hon. Member for
Dulwich and West Norwood () support that legislation so
that it can go through swiftly? Will she also encourage the
Members of her party to support my Bill to make the best practice
guidance on school attendance mandatory? I know that she will
want to look at every single word of it, but it would be
brilliant if she could give her support in principle because then
we could do both these things now.
We agree that there should be a register of home-educated
children and that there should be measures to tackle persistent
absence. It is bizarre that Government Members chose to vote
against the measures before the House this afternoon, which they
agree with. Those measures were simply intended to accelerate the
process of delivering a commitment that the Government have
already made.
rose—
I will not give way again. The right hon. Lady will also know
that private Members’ Bills progress if the Government give them
time. It is not the Opposition who are holding up those measures,
and she would do well to turn her attention to the shocking
record of her own Government on this issue, which they have been
allowing to slide for 14 years, and the question of why action
has not been taken any sooner. If the Government allow time for
the Bills to be debated, the Opposition will support the measures
with which we agree. Frankly, that is a matter for the
Government. The right hon. Lady’s obsession with the Opposition’s
position when our position has been set out really clearly is
bizarre.
Will the hon. Lady give way again?
(in the Chair)
Order. The hon. Lady is not giving way.
I am going to make some progress, I am afraid. I will not give
way again.
We need a comprehensive strategy for addressing the complex issue
of persistent absence. Labour will empower Ofsted to review
absence as part of the annual safeguarding spot checks. The
outdated and dreaded Ofsted inspection regime urgently needs
reforming; one-word judgments are unhelpful for parents and put
unnecessary stress on teachers and other school staff. So, as
part of a series of reforms to Ofsted inspections, we will
introduce annual school checks covering persistent absence, among
other areas.
Absence rates among children with special educational needs and
disabilities are particularly high. Labour will ensure that
mainstream schools are inclusive, making inclusivity part of the
Ofsted inspection framework, and introducing a new annual
continuing professional development entitlement for teachers that
can be used to boost their expertise to teach children with SEND.
Good mental health and wellbeing is also vital for school
attendance, and Labour will ensure that there is mental health
support available in every school and that children and young
people have an open-access mental health hub in every
community.
Labour will reform the curriculum to deliver a better foundation
in reading, writing and maths. We will ensure that children do
not miss out on music, sport, art and drama, keeping schools a
happy and joyful place to be, making children want to come to
school—to enjoy it, not to dread it.
Urgent action is needed now to bring down the rates of school
absences. Labour’s projections, using data from the Department
for Education, suggest that the number of children persistently
absent from school will rise to more than 2 million in 2025-26
under current trends. That is more than one in four children and
young people across the country. We face a lost generation
missing from Britain’s schools—a tragic example of national
decline under this Government. We desperately need a Government
who will put children first: one who will prioritise education,
as Labour did when we were last in government. Labour has a
vision for education and a plan to deliver a world-class
education for every child, giving schools the right tools to
deliver it.
But to break down those barriers to opportunity, our children
need to be in school. That is why this debate is so important,
and why we need a Labour Government to tackle the problem. In the
short term, it is so disappointing that the right hon. and hon.
Members on the Government Benches failed to support the
Opposition’s motion this afternoon to bring forward the Children
Not in School (National Register and Support) Bill in February.
There is not a moment to lose to secure the future of children
across the country, and we will support every effort to deliver
that.
5.27pm
The Minister for Skills, Apprenticeships and Higher Education
()
It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship today, Mr Twigg.
Thank you for your kindness earlier. I apologise to my hon.
Friend the Member for The Cotswolds ( ) for leaving
slightly early to get to the vote, as I missed a little of his
otherwise excellent speech.
I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford
(), my constituency neighbour in
Essex—we have got Essex man and Essex woman here today—on
securing this debate. She has championed this subject and is
absolutely right to do so, because we know that regular school
attendance is vital for children’s attainment, mental wellbeing
and long-term development, and it is crucial that we have a
support system in place to ensure that every child attends school
every day, ready to learn and thrive.
My hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds talked about the
damage of school closures. Wearing my previous hat as Chair of
the Education Committee, I spent a huge amount of my time
campaigning against school closures, as I thought that everything
we are talking about today, both here and in the main Chamber,
would come to pass. I have to say that I was opposed
significantly by not everyone, but a lot of Members on the
Opposition Benches, and of course some—not all, to be fair—of the
unions. I thought, at the time, that it would cause significant
damage.
The attendance challenge has grown since the start of the
pandemic, not only in England but around the world. There is
evidence that, post pandemic, some attitudes to absence have
changed. There is a greater propensity to keep a child at home
with a minor illness such as a cough or a cold, and we can
understand why that has happened. We must at least try and
recalibrate back to where we were pre-covid, when an attendance
of 95% was achieved year after year.
(Isle of Wight) (Con)
I fully support the idea behind the Bill introduced by my right
hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (), and indeed the complementary
Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (Mrs
Drummond). Will the Minister find the time to meet me to discuss
specifically home schooling and how it relates to absenteeism on
the Isle of Wight, where we have over three times the national
average of home-schooled kids? While I absolutely respect the
rights of responsible parents, I worry that especially after
covid, some of those home-schooled kids are simply absentee kids
from school who are not learning, and who are drifting into
isolation, mental health problems or criminality.
As always, my hon. Friend makes powerful points. I think he
speaks not just for some—and I stress some—younger people in his
constituency, but also for those across the country. I am not the
Schools Minister or the Children’s Minister—I am standing in
because of the debate in the main Chamber—but I will mention what
my hon. Friend has requested, and I will ask for a meeting with
the Schools Minister or the Children’s Minister to discuss the
important issues that he has raised.
Contrary to what has been suggested by the shadow Minister, we
have started to see some progress, although there is a long way
to go. There were 380,000 fewer pupils persistently absent or not
attending school in 2022-23 than in 2021-22. Overall absence for
the autumn term that has just finished was 6.8%, down from 7.5%
in Autumn 2022. That means that, on average, pupils in England
are attending school for the equivalent of around a day and a
half more across an academic year then they did last year.
It is difficult to make direct comparisons, but we know that
absenteeism is a problem not just in the UK, but in other parts
of the world too. However, there are signs that our approach is
bearing fruit. I mentioned that my right hon. Friend the Member
for Chelmsford is my constituency neighbour. Absence rates for
Essex are very much in line with those of England as a whole, and
they mirror the improvements seen nationally in the most recent
terms.
We are committed to working with schools and local authorities to
drive up attendance rates, and we have a six-point plan to deal
with some of the problems. We have set out stronger expectations
of the system, including requiring schools to have an attendance
policy, appointing attendance champions and expecting local
authorities to hold termly meetings with schools to agree
individual plans for at-risk children.
We have established an alliance of national leaders from
education, children’s social care and allied services to work
together to raise school attendance and reduce persistent
absence, and the Attendance Action Alliance has pledged to take a
range of actions to remove barriers preventing children attending
school. The attendance data tool allows early intervention to
avoid absences becoming entrenched, and 88% of schools are
already taking part in the daily data pilot. We are committed to
requiring all schools to share their daily registers as part of
the programme.
We have expanded our attendance hubs, which will see almost 2,000
schools supported to tackle persistent absence—reaching around 1
million pupils. We have also launched a campaign to re-emphasise
the importance of every school day, not just for learning, but
for wellbeing, experiences and friendships too. From September,
our attendance mentor pilot will be extended to 10 new areas.
Trained mentors will work with more than 10,000 persistently and
severely absent children and their families to help them back to
school.
Both the hon. Member for City of Durham () and the shadow Minister
rightly talked about mental health and special educational needs.
We are now spending £10.5 billion on special educational
needs—that is a 60% increase since 2019. The Children’s Minister
has a lot of work under way on this, including a plan for special
educational needs which will standardise education, health and
social care plans, so that we end the postcode lottery that my
hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds mentioned.
The hon. Member for City of Durham also asked several questions.
As I understand it—I will ask the School Buildings Minister to
discuss the issue that she raised—the Department for Education
has contacted the Durham research team, offering to discuss the
report and clarify areas of mission. We have worked closely with
St Leonard’s to provide additional spaces for learning and to put
extra education provisions in place. All pupils at St Leonard’s
have been in face-to-face education since October and additional
educational support is available for those pupils due to sit
exams next year, with specialist facilities being sourced at
other providers in the local area and transport being provided
for pupils. Nevertheless, as I have already said, I will ask the
School Buildings Minister to talk to her.
We have had a number of meetings with Ministers. I had a meeting
booked in last week with the Minister for Schools, the right hon.
Member for East Hampshire (), which he cancelled, and it
was also cancelled today, so hopefully it will go ahead tomorrow.
However, one of the big priorities for the school is that
mitigation will be put in place for the education that has been
lost. It is now 18 weeks that there have been issues and those
pupils doing their exams have not yet had specialist equipment
for any of their coursework, so I implore the Minister to impress
that upon the Minister for Schools.
I will ensure that the Schools Minister, or the School Buildings
Minister, hear what the hon. Lady says; I will pass on her
remarks. And I am sure that that meeting will take place.
Will my right hon. Friend the Minister give way?
I want to carry on, if I may, because I only have a few minutes
in which to speak and I want to respond to some of the points
that have already been made. However, if I do have time to take
an intervention, I will give way a bit later, if my hon. Friend
will be so kind.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford referred to the
School Attendance (Duties of Local Authorities and Proprietors of
Schools) Bill, which she herself presented before Christmas. As
she has said, that Bill will introduce two new legal duties on
schools and local authorities respectively. I am grateful for her
work on the Bill and welcome her contribution to the debate. I
and the Government look forward to the future stages of the Bill
as it progresses through the House, which she will know about,
because she will have had discussions with the relevant
Ministers. Those stages include Second Reading next Friday.
We absolutely remain committed to making guidance on school
attendance statutory, which has already been discussed this
afternoon by my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds and my
right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford. We are exploring all
avenues to do that. That is in recognition of the attendance
challenge and to help ensure that local authorities and schools
consistently meet the expectations made of them, under our
“support first” approach.
There was also some discussion of mental health. All Members here
today will be pleased to know that mental health support teams
now cover almost 44% of pupils in schools and further education,
and that percentage will increase to around 50% by March next
year. We have also committed to offer all state schools and
colleges a grant to train a senior mental health lead by 2025,
which will make a huge difference. Over 14,400 schools and
colleges have received a senior mental health lead training grant
so far, including more than seven in 10 state-funded secondary
schools in England.
As a Government, we also remain committed to introducing the
statutory local authority registers for children not in school,
as well as a duty for local authorities to provide support to
home-educating families, which my hon. Friend the Member for Isle
of Wight () mentioned in his intervention.
That is to help ensure that all children receive a suitable
education and are safe, regardless of where they are educated.
That is the crucial point.
We warmly welcome the Children Not In School (Register) Bill of
my hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (Mrs Drummond) and
await its Second Reading on 15 March. I am also grateful to my
right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford for the dedication
that she has shown. We will continue to work with local
authorities to improve their existing non-statutory registers,
and support them to ensure that all children in their area
receive a suitable education. Also, the Department recently held
a consultation on revised elective home education guidance for
local authorities and parents, with the aim of improving
consistency of practice across all local authorities. That
consultation closed on 18 January and we are currently analysing
the responses to it.
My hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds also mentioned
attendance mentoring and I welcome his support for what the
Government are doing. We are currently delivering support in
Middlesbrough, Doncaster, Knowsley, Stoke and Salford, and will
expand into 10 new areas later this year to reach 10,000 children
who are severely absent. Having heard me say that, I hope he will
see that a lot is going on to try to resolve this very difficult
problem.
I am grateful to the Minister for giving way; I think he has
time. Will he address the problem that I mentioned at the end of
my speech, which was about the liaison between local education
authorities and the Department of Health and Social Care, and
mental health trusts in particular? In Gloucestershire, the
waiting lists for children with mental health problems are
extremely long. We really need to do better by our young
people.
(in the Chair)
I am sure the Minister is aware that he should leave a minute or
two for the right hon. Member for Chelmsford to wind up.
Yes. I will finish in a couple of minutes. The “health” part of
an education, health and care plan is fundamental. I absolutely
agree that co-operation work needs to go on, and a lot of work is
going on to ensure that the H part of an EHC plan does exactly as
he describes.
The legacy of the pandemic means that absence levels are still
too high. Improvements have been made, but there is a lot of work
to do. Too many children are missing out on the opportunities
that regular school attendance provides, but I reassure pupils,
parents, teachers, local authorities, and health and other
partners that we remain committed to working with them to tackle
the issues through our “support first” approach, building on the
strengths of the current system and the success that we achieved
together prior to the pandemic.
Being in school has never been more valuable, with standards
continuing to rise. I thank our brilliant teachers, heads and
everyone who has worked with us—in Essex, in Chelmsford, in my
own constituency of Harlow, in the Cotswolds, in Durham, in the
Isle of Wight and in the other constituencies across the
country—because the teachers and support staff are the people
responsible who are doing so much to make sure that we make
progress on this very difficult issue.5.42pm
I thank hon. Members and right hon. Members for taking part in
this debate. I was very moved to hear about the situation at St
Leonard’s School in the City of Durham. Three schools in my
constituency were affected by RAAC, and Essex County Council,
working with the Department, was phenomenal. It turned around
approvals really quickly and got in temporary classrooms where
they were needed, so that every child in my constituency was in
face-to-face learning at the beginning of this term. Essex had
more RAAC schools than anywhere else, and the county council was
phenomenal in turning it around. Some schools had it very badly,
but they were very few; when so many kids are anxious, we need to
be really careful to remember that the vast majority of children
are in safe schools. I hope that the hon. Member for City of
Durham () gets her meetings and
those issues addressed.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds ( ), who spoke
beautifully, especially about the impact on small rural schools.
Obviously, the ones in my constituency are bigger, inner-city
schools. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight
() for taking the opportunity to
mention schools on the Island, a place of which I am very fond.
It is important that the issue of children missing out because
they are off the school register is considered.
With regard to my private Member’s Bill, I make no apology for
being obsessed with making sure that children get education, or
for being obsessed with doing the best I can to deal with this
issue. To get the private Member’s Bill through the House does
not need the Government to give time; what it needs is for no
Member of this place to object to it when I move it at Second
Reading. Any Member could object to it, and it would then go back
to the bottom of the queue. To get it through on Friday 2
February, I just need to know that no Member of this House will
object to it. I know that the Government will not object to it; I
have been talking to all Members on the Government side of the
House to make sure that there will be no objections from our
side. If the Opposition would kindly check, if possible, that
there are no objections on their side—I am happy to talk to
anyone who has concerns—it will enable the Bill to move
swiftly.
I thank all Members for treating the issue seriously. It is a
real issue, and it needs us all to work across parties to perform
the No. 1 recommendation, which is to make sure that all schools
and local authorities have to follow best practice. That is what
the Bill will do.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered school attendance.
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