Holidays in School Term Time 

Monday 25th November 2024 Westminster Hall

16:30

[Dave Robertson (Lichfield) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered e-petition 658365 relating to holidays during school term time.

It is a pleasure to address you, Sir Edward, in what is an important debate and my first attempt at presenting a debate on behalf of the Petitions Committee. I am chuffed to do so, because this subject is really positive. I am sure that everyone in this Chamber has fond childhood memories of family time away from home. When I look back, I have clear memories of spending a lot of time in north Wales with my family. I was fortunate that both my parents were teachers so, as soon as the school holidays came around, we were all available. I thank my parents very thoroughly for that.

Later in life, I followed mam and dad into the family trade by becoming a teacher, where I saw at first hand the impact that absence can have on attainment and progress at school. Often through no fault of the child or the parents, kids were unable to be in school and they fell behind, which made life difficult for them. I am sure all Members in this Chamber would want to avoid a situation in which any kid is unnecessarily held back for any reason, particularly attendance.

This issue is complex, and I have experience of both sides of it, as I am sure many Members have; I am sure that very soon we will hear a similar speech from my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Dr Gardner), who is also a former teacher.

There is a reason that this petition has received so much support from so many people from right across the breadth of the United Kingdom: who can say anything to a parent who wants to spend more time with their kids? It is so fundamental and so positive, and I think everybody would support that, which is why this petition was started and why it has been so clearly supported.

The debate is about those really positive things, but it boils down to an issue of affordability. Anybody who has looked into this will know of the significant increases in the price of holidays, whether domestic or foreign, whether travelling by air or by train. The price of holidays flies through the roof during school break periods, and that has a real impact on parents. They want to spend time with their kids away from home to build memories but, for far too many people, doing so in the 13 weeks of the school holidays has become unaffordable because of the escalating cost.

I spoke to the petitioners last Thursday, and they made it clear that they completely understand the importance of kids being in school. One of the first things they said to me was that they enjoy the fact that their kids come home from school, tell them what they did that day and are so full of life and the learning of the day. But the petitioners also understand the holistic benefits of kids spending time away from a formalised learning environment for some self-directed time and a change of scenery, even if that is just some different walls.

However, one of the things the petitioner raised is that, unfortunately, a lot of families who want to build those memories are unable to do so during the school holidays because of affordability. They therefore have to take the kids out of school during term time, because they believe it important to enable their kids to enjoy their childhoods. However, parents can be fined for that, which leads to their feeling criminalised and as though they have done something wrong, although I am sure that everybody would agree that taking kids on a break to help them to build childhood memories is really positive.

[Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

It is not just about the joy of the holiday; the problem is that there is no compassion in the system. I was contacted today by a resident who took their child out of school for two weeks because their grandfather is dying in India, and they have just been fined. They know that their child needs education, and they are passionate about it, but they face the risk that, because the grandfather is dying but has not died, they may get some sort of parenting order if they take their child out again for the funeral—he should go, as part of the extended family. That is ridiculous, so we need to recognise that this is about not just money but compassion.

[Dave Robertson]

It is hard to follow that intervention, because how could anybody disagree with that? Spending time with a dying family member at the end of their life is so important not just for those who pass away but for those who remain, because those memories live with us forever. I am sure those parents were between a rock and a hard place, but made the only decision that any of us would have made, despite the difficulties that they now face. It is clear from stories such as that and others that I have heard over the past few weeks that there is a real problem.

The petition mentions the equalities impact, and says:

“This can be a particular issue for…children that have additional needs”.

Parents raising children with additional needs may already face significant extra costs, whether because they have to buy things for the home, or software and other things to support their kids in school, or because they are simply fighting through a special educational needs and disabilities system that does not work and they face additional costs from having to raise things through tribunals.

In preparing for this debate, I was supported by our excellent Petitions Committee staff to meet members of the National Autistic Society, who said that they valued the opportunity to contribute to it. They said that, because of the issues in the SEND system, they spend a lot of time talking to people about the importance of kids being in school and helping parents to get their kids into school as often as possible. That is sometimes not easy, but a person should face no detriment if they spend some time with their kids, go away or, as the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Vikki Slade) said, take some time for compassionate reasons.

We also met Parentkind, which highlighted some really interesting data from Wales. It recently carried out a consultation about changes to the school year, and a majority of the parents it surveyed support a change so that the long holiday period in the summer is shortened a bit and some of those weeks are moved to other parts of the year. But although 56% of all parents support a more evenly spread school year, 59% of those on a lower income are in favour. That may not seem like a huge difference—it is only 3%—but those parents are contained in the other number, so it is probably closer to 6%, and various other points can be made about the data. The important point is that people from lower income backgrounds—people who are not as rich as their peers—feel more strongly that stretching out and moving around the school holidays would be positive. Part of that may be that it is easier to arrange childcare when they do not need to do six weeks back to back, and part of it may be due to things that are happening in Wales—processes, festivals and things that I am not aware of because it is a while since I have been there. The cost of holidays might be one of the driving factors that led to that slightly different opinion between the two income brackets.

[Neil Duncan-Jordan (Poole) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend think that there needs to be an impact assessment carried out by the Government on the way the current rules impact particularly on low-income families?

[Dave Robertson]

I thank my hon. Friend for his contribution. He is somewhat skipping ahead to the later parts of my speech, but I like him, so I will let him off. The Government need to do something about this, and as I will touch on later, there are a lot of proposed solutions. A lot of parents—obviously, the 250,000 who signed the petition in just three months, before the general election brought it to an end—think that there needs to be some type of solution. The petition proposes giving parents the opportunity to have up to 10 school days—two weeks—away from school with their children, but a variety of different things have been suggested. My hon. Friend has suggested another, and I am sure the Minister is listening.

As part of the preparation for this speech, I spoke to a range of organisations to take their views. Every single organisation that I spoke to recognised that there was an issue here, and that there was real value in kids being able to access a field of learning or a different experience from being at school in a formalised learning environment. I cannot say that any of them were absolutely jumping on and saying, “This is definitely a solution to that.” Actually, all the organisations I spoke to suggested slightly different solutions.

I spoke to the National Association of Head Teachers, which I thank for its helpful input. It suggested that returning some discretion to headteachers—as was certainly the case when I was in school and at the start of my teaching career—could be used to support parents, where appropriate. The headteacher would have the discretion to say no, should there be other issues with a child and their attendance. Parentkind kindly talked me through a significant amount of information on how the school year is organised, the potential for changing it, and whether that might be able to drive some changes.

The National Autistic Society recognised the issue, but emphasised how important it is to get kids into school. A lot of its work is on ensuring that kids are able to access education, but it recognised that there was maybe space for some work in the area. It suggested talking to market organisations and travel providers about whether we could change the affordability issue, which might then lead to a different situation for parents across the school holidays. The Centre for Young Lives was clear that the free market is not delivering for families. It is certainly not delivering for kids, and that is leading to some of the issues.

[James McMurdock (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Reform)]

The hon. Gentleman is making an interesting point about the free market. We have a clear supply and demand issue. We have a huge glut during the summer holidays, and then a drought. I will give an example—I will not reference the British holiday destination, but it would be a firm favourite with most people. A typical family of four to six could spend five days there for £500 or £600 one week, but in excess of £2000 for the exact same holiday the following week because it is outside of term time. Does he agree that because of the supply and demand issue, giving discretion or allowing more variety in how schools use their time might be options worth pursuing, rather than trying to constrain business?

[Dave Robertson]

The hon. Gentleman has almost taken me to the conclusion I was coming to anyway, so I thank him for the appropriate segue. As ever, there are more solutions than problems for Government, but finding the right one is difficult. In the work and engagement I have done on this, it has really come through that there is a problem. There are lots of ideas about what we could do, and although it is unlikely that there is one instantaneous solution, there is potential around discretion, working with the market, and changing school days—although a significant caveat is that teachers are often parents too, and if they do not teach in the same local authority area in which they live, then moving the holidays around might cause them significant additional issues. There are also issues with teachers being able to afford holidays with their families.

It is a real vipers’ nest, and I do not envy the Minister having to try to find his way through it. There are probably more solutions than we need on this issue, and finding the right one will be a real challenge for the Government. I am very eager to hear the Minister’s response because, as I am sure a lot of people would say, the system is not working at the minute. Hopefully, we can use the great power of the British state to look into this issue and find a better way forward for parents and pupils.

16:45

[Dr Allison Gardner (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield (Dave Robertson) for introducing the petition and the debate in Westminster Hall. As I have said previously, I am a teacher of 30 years’ experience, but I also have fantastic and wonderful children in my family who have certain difficulties. In the past, it has absolutely been the best possible thing for us go away on a family holiday for various reasons. We still think we did the right thing, so I see this debate from both sides.

As we have heard today, school attendance is absolutely vital to children’s development, for not just their academic skills but their social skills, as well as their mental and physical wellbeing. I am proud to support a Government who are committed to properly resourcing our education system. However, with an absence rate of 6.7% last autumn, we risk far too many children being left behind, and we have a unique situation at the moment post-covid. There are more difficulties with school attendance and in addressing the mental health problems of children, so I appreciate that we are in challenging times.

As we have heard, there are some very good reasons why a child may be absent, and there are children and families in my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent South who are in difficult—but sadly not unique—circumstances, including bereavement. Bereavement is never just a one-off but often a long sequence of events, so the point from the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Vikki Slade) was well made, and I thank her for it. Fines will not only beat those people down but fail to encourage attendance. If a family has a child with special educational needs and disabilities who is having a particularly difficult time, and who needs more time, the fine is not an incentive; it is a punishment for looking after their child.

As the petition clearly sets out, there are families for whom travelling outside term time is quite impossible. While costs are higher, planes and trains are also overcrowded, so it is not just about the costs, although there are families in financial difficulties. For children with special needs or in unique situations, travelling at very busy times can be challenging. We sometimes need family holidays in difficult times, and those difficult times do not respect term times, so taking our child out of school is the only option.

Again, this unfairly punishes already struggling families, and worse, it compounds an issue that already exists. I understand that there are still some exemptions at the discretion of headteachers, but as we have just heard, more needs to be done with them. From speaking to parents who have contacted me, and I spoke to one only this morning, I can say that that discretion is not always evenly exercised, so this is not hypothetical. In Stoke-on-Trent South, my constituents are 20% more likely to be living with learning disabilities than the national average. The parent whom I spoke to today has a neurodiverse child who, as frequently happens, went undiagnosed. As a result, he faced a series of circumstances in school, from which he experienced quite severe trauma, and he eventually became a school avoider. I want to stress that I know the mum of that family; they are good parents who have given up a huge amount for their child, and indeed they have a second child with special educational needs. The threat of fines does nothing to help them or their child, and it just adds stress on to stress.

I want to take a little time to go deeper into that story, which I heard only today. That parent was taken into school and told, “Right, we need to talk about fines. We are going to take you down the court process.” The threat of court was used against the parents, and as the child was having significant problems, when they tried to get him into school, he would have a meltdown. As we have all seen, if a parent is dealing with a very young child who does not want to do something, that child kicks and lashes out. The teacher saw the child being violent to their parents and it was even suggested that they use the youth offender system with a primary school child. They do not need that sort of stress. In the parent support group my constituent was given advice—and other parents report this too—such as, “Try making your home life more miserable so that they want to go to school.” That indicates the experience of parents who are fighting to do the best by their child, with children who do not want to go to school. They are just trying their best to manage, and the fines system is causing supreme difficulty for them.

I was a teacher for 30 years, so I know what it is like from the teacher’s perspective. When there is absenteeism teachers have to try to catch up a child who has been away while still trying to teach the other children and bring them forward. There are the gifted and talented children who are flying ahead, the children who need more direct support, and then there is the child who has been absent for two weeks and is saying, “I don’t understand anything, Miss, what’s going on?” It is really challenging, so I understand the perspective of the school. The education system and the teachers want the other children as well as that child to get the best possible education, but it is challenging to work in those environments. I see that side of things.

I have also seen countless children and parents struggling with attendance, not because the child just does not want to go to school, but as part of a more complex and unique set of needs that cannot be solved with fines. For those parents, especially those on lower incomes for whom the fines will be more damaging, there must be exceptions. With 30% of children in my constituency living in relative poverty—again, above the national average—the whole fine and court process is too punitive. Having to travel at expensive times is difficult.

The process does not produce the intended outcome of improving attendance. It taxes an already overwhelmed system, and places further burdens on those who need support, not punishment. We need a balanced approach that tackles those who take their children out for unwarranted reasons—I understand that—but that supports families who are struggling to best help their children. Sometimes that means taking them outside school in schooltime, to have a break and some respite—it is not a holiday; it is a period of respite. I therefore support the principle of the petition.

16:52

[Ian Sollom (St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I thank those Members who have made contributions, and the hon. Member for Lichfield (Dave Robertson) for bringing this debate before us on behalf of the petitioners. I thank the 250,000 members of the public who made their voices heard by signing the petition so that it could be heard in Parliament.

The UK is facing an absence crisis in schools, it is fair to say. While the pandemic gave rise to a huge spike in pupil absence, since the restrictions were fully lifted in 2022, absence rates have yet to drop back down to pre-pandemic levels. In fact, the general absence rate in the 2022-23 academic year was still over one and a half times higher than the rates recorded during the six years before the pandemic. Persistent absence—missing 10% or more of lessons over a year—does a huge amount of damage to children’s education and prospects, both academically and socially. To emphasise the point, 19.2% of children in England were persistently absent by that definition during the last academic year.

The Liberal Democrats have welcomed the Government’s mission to lower school absence rates. The announcement of free breakfast clubs in all primary schools in England, in a programme due to roll out next year, is a very good way to start addressing the persistent absence problem.

However, the Liberal Democrats also believe that the use of increasingly punitive measures to tackle pupil absence more widely is wrong. Parents and other primary carers of children are responsible not just for their academic attainment but for their overall wellbeing and learning. Inflexible fines, which have also recently increased, are not the one-size-fits-all answer that they are often made out to be. Of course, fines work as a deterrent in many cases, but we have to encourage—demand, even—that schools first work with parents to understand the root causes of absences, which involves addressing the needs of absent children, and then work to find the solutions to get them back in school. Simply slapping parents with financial punishment for issues that are often completely out of their control is not the answer.

The petition concerns the specific issue of absence due to holidays. I am sure that no hon. Member here would doubt the importance of family holidays for children. Whether abroad or in the UK, the chance for a child to have a break from their usual routine, perhaps while visiting and socialising with relatives or seeing historical sites, is important. The hon. Member for Lichfield has fond memories of childhood holidays in Wales; perhaps he is a budding Dylan Thomas. Such experiences of other cultures are invaluable for personal growth.

For many families, organising holidays during the 175 days a year that their children are not expected to be in school is absolutely not a problem. Many parents can afford to pay the frankly enormously hiked holiday package prices during periods of high demand, and being packed into tourist attractions at the busiest times of year is just accepted as a fact of life. However, as other Members have already pointed out today, for some families those factors, particularly the financial ones, are completely prohibitive. For a child who is unable to go on holiday outside term time, the lesson in which they are tasked with writing an account of how they spent their summer may well be one they completely dread. Feeling excluded, singled out or sidelined in daily life is the antithesis of an inclusive education.

Does the Minister agree that the burden should not be on parents to shell out thousands of pounds on the additional costs of a holiday or risk facing inflexible fines, and that instead airlines and travel operators should stop taking advantage of such families? Nearly doubling the price of the same holiday package from one day to the next is simply exploitative and completely out of line with any surge in demand. We have talked in other contexts about surge pricing this year; it is exploitative.

The school holidays issue is indicative of a wider issue, which is that school absence is generally—indeed, inherently—linked to a family’s financial situation. In the 2022-23 school year, 36.5% of children eligible for free school meals were absent from school, compared with only 15.6% of children who were not eligible. The Government’s very provision of those meals and the new breakfast clubs that I mentioned indicates that they see the correlation between a family’s finances and a child’s attendance. I therefore ask the Minister what the Government will do to relieve holiday-related financial burdens for those who clearly need it most.

Aside from financial concerns, we should also consider that term dates are decided by local authorities and schools, so we could encourage them to organise term dates in such a way that the largest number of families in their communities can benefit from the 175 days a year that can be used for holidays. For example, giving a lengthy Christmas holiday to a community where a large number of families are not Christian can mean that those communities are effectively barred from properly celebrating their own religious festivals, or face fines if they take their children out of school to do so.

Some schools have found a way around that issue by pushing together all their inset and training days, rather than spreading them out over the year, so that families have consecutive days to celebrate those festivals or even to book some time away together outside high-demand times. That indicates part of the answer: a way forward that is about collaboration, rather than simply punishment.

I am trying to highlight that, in many cases, it is not that parents are actively choosing to take their child out of school, but that their child has been forced out of the school system by factors outside their control. I have only scratched the surface of financial burdens, but we should not debate the issue without addressing the point of the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Dr Gardner) regarding the needs of pupils with SEND, to which group I would also add young carers or those with mental health conditions. Their needs are consistently not being met in the classroom or at home, because of the knock-on effect and pressure.

I will give an example from my constituency. Across Cambridgeshire, the rates of school absence for those with SEN support and those with EHCPs—education, health and care plans—are quietly rising year on year. I suggest that that is a direct consequence of inadequate SEND and EHCP funding, which, in Cambridgeshire’s case, is stuck at levels decided nearly 10 years ago.

That is a multifaceted problem that needs to be tackled constructively, not punitively. The Liberal Democrats have long called for measures, particularly around mental health, such as having a dedicated, qualified mental health professional in every primary and secondary school, and giving local authorities extra funding to reduce the amount that schools have to pay towards the costs of EHCPs.

The bottom line is that we need to understand why a child is not attending school, whether that is because of holidays, the financial reasons that I mentioned, SEND or young caring responsibilities. Understanding that is the most effective step towards beginning to reduce the problem; we have to understand it if we are going to do anything about it. I suggest that the Government adopt the Liberal Democrat proposal of setting up a register of children who are not in school to build that understanding and, therefore, remove the underlying barriers to attendance.

The solution to this petition, and indeed the wider issue of school absence, is not to make children attend school, but to ensure that they are able to do so—not forcing but enabling them. The Government, parents and care givers jointly have a duty to provide children with the education they deserve. Costly punishments are not the solution.

17:05

[Neil O’Brien (Harborough, Oadby and Wigston) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I declare an interest: as a parent of two primary school children, I am acutely aware of the cost of doing anything fun with small children. Like other Members who have spoken, I wince when I look at the cost of going on holiday anywhere and see that it is radically cheaper just a few weeks before the school holidays, so I completely understand the motivation behind this petition and why so many people have signed it. I echo what the hon. Member for Lichfield (Dave Robertson) said about the importance of those memories. I will have the memories of being on the north coast of Scotland this summer with my small children forever.

I will come to what we can do to make it easier for parents, but I will first touch on the very good speeches and interventions from the hon. Members for Lichfield, for Stoke-on-Trent South (Dr Gardner), for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Vikki Slade), for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) and for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire (Ian Sollom). I agree that we have a major school attendance issue, so we need to address the petition in that context.

People often think, “Well, if we’re out a bit, it’s not so bad. Being absent a lot is a problem, but is being absent a bit really a problem?” The statistical truth is that it is a big problem, unfortunately. If there is a 10% decrease in pupils’ attendance at school, the number who get a GCSE grade 5 or above in English and maths halves: 55% of those in the 0% to 5% range of absence get grade 5 or above, but only 22% in the 10% to 15% range do so. What seems like not a huge decrease in attendance has a huge impact. As Members who are former teachers expressed well, those pupils lose the thread, start to fall behind and find it difficult to follow the sequence of what others have already learned, so the problems compound. That is why it is a problem for them not to be in school when they need to be.

When the Conservatives were in office, we took steps to address this major challenge, which has become particularly acute since the pandemic. Schools have always had a duty to keep a register of children not in school, but we worked with local authorities to make it more accurate and we committed to making it statutory. In January, we committed to double the number of attendance hubs to support about 1 million extra children with attendance.

We did things at different levels. We invested £15 million in one-to-one monitoring for 10,000 children with particularly severe attendance issues. For a wider group of pupils with quite serious attendance problems, we put an extra £200 million into the Supporting Families programme—an early intervention programme—taking the spending to £700 million a year. As the issue overlaps to some extent with special educational needs, we increased spending on the high-needs block by 70%—£4 billion extra a year. People may say, “It’s not enough because the need is ever expanding,” and I completely understand that. We need to do more, but it is worth noting that that money has gone in. We also need to tackle the root causes of the growth of demand. I am sure the Government agree with that and want to do more about it.

We were making progress on the attendance challenge. In school year 2022-23, we had 440,000 fewer persistently absent pupils than the year before, but there was still a long way to go because the patterns of attendance had not got back to pre-pandemic levels. In truth, even before the pandemic, although the proportion of pupils with good attendance was about 70% in primary school, in secondary school it dipped down in years 9 and 10 to just above 60%, and the problem was radically compounded after the pandemic.

There are a lot of different bits to this—people working from home with their kids there, or taking days here and there; people having the challenge of wanting to go on holiday; and much more serious social problems, with children who are routinely and significantly not in school a lot of the time—but we cannot lose sight of, and would do a disservice to parents if we did not share with them, the evidence that what might seem like small amounts of non-attendance have pretty bad effects on pupils’ attendance.

I am absolutely not saying, however, that nothing can be done; Members have alluded to some of the ideas. The hon. Member for Lichfield did a good job of talking to all the different people who care about the issue. He mentioned the Parentkind idea about when the school terms are, and I have some experience of that in Leicestershire: we are out of step with everybody—for historical reasons to do with how the factories used to shut in Nottingham, Derby and Leicester, we finish our school year a week earlier than everyone else and go back a week earlier than everyone else.

The last Government looked at whether, as Members have suggested, we could do more to stagger school holidays around the country. Obviously, Scotland often has different holidays, but the challenge—I have direct experience of this—is where we have a border. There was a brief moment when schools in the city of Leicester and Leicestershire had their holidays at different times, which was a massive pain for parents, because of course if they had one kid in school, but one needed looking after at home, they could not go on holiday.

I think there is potential in staggering holidays, and I understand why local authorities might want to explore that to give parents the benefits of finding cheaper holidays, but I would add that caution is needed. If we create borders with parents’ kids on either side of them, we can create problems for the parents, rather than making any of the problems better.

I am entirely sympathetic: the Government could do a huge array of things to make it easier to go on holiday, such as improve the cost of living for parents, and think about the taxes on holidays and on flying in this country. I am supportive of schools, and of course they have to be compassionate and sensible, in particular about bereavement as the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole pointed out, as well as using their discretion.

My own schools on the edge of Leicester do a good job of using their discretion to be sensible about the fact that they are often juggling the festivals of at least four different major world religions at the same time, which is not easy. We also have to be careful and honest with parents about the risks of deciding not to attend school and to miss a couple of weeks, which might not seem like a lot, but which we and the educators in the Chamber know can have a particularly bad effect on kids’ education. We must balance our desire to make things cheaper for parents with our desire for children to get a good education. We must continue the work—which I am sure the Government will do—of ensuring that we get school absence under control, because it is such an important driver of overall achievement.

17:13

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Stephen Morgan)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward, and I welcome to his place the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston (Neil O’Brien), who made some very reasonable remarks. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield (Dave Robertson) for introducing the debate and all Members who have contributed, on both sides of the House.

Let me start by acknowledging the points made by Members across the Chamber on the issue of holidays in particular. I sympathise with families who, for a variety of reasons, wish to avoid the busier and more expensive periods. As we heard from Members, including a number of former teachers, school attendance is clearly an important issue that a lot of people in this country care deeply about.

This Government are acting decisively to tackle absence via a new approach rooted in responsibility, partnership and belonging. That includes supporting schools and recognising that they have important responsibilities to create a welcoming, engaging and inclusive environment for children, and it also include parents’ legal responsibility to send their children to school every day that they can. That is why we will not automatically grant two weeks of term-time absence to every pupil.

Tackling absence from school is at the heart of our mission to break down barriers to opportunity. Sometimes, of course, children are too poorly to attend school, but we are currently facing an absence epidemic in this country, with one in five children persistently absent, missing the equivalent of a day every other week. Thanks to the hard work of the sector, there has been progress, but we remain a long way off pre-pandemic levels.

If children are not in school, it does not matter how effective or well supported teaching or learning is, as they will not benefit. That is why the Government have the highest possible expectations of all children’s attendance at school, and why we will ensure that school is the best place for every child, with free breakfast clubs in primary schools so that every child is on time and ready to learn; better mental health support through access to specialist mental health professionals in every school; and inclusion for children with special educational needs and disabilities within mainstream settings right across the age range. We will make sure that parents are supported to send their children to school and that schools are supported to welcome them.

The reason that this such a top priority for the Government is that we know the overwhelming benefits of regular school attendance for children’s attainment, mental wellbeing and long-term development. The most recent DFE data shows that an increase in absence is associated with dramatic reductions in attainment, with 18% fewer children who miss two weeks of the school year achieving good GCSE results compared with those who are in almost every day. Other independent studies support that finding.

Some Members have questioned whether that evidence applies specifically to absence for holidays, and there is clear evidence that it does. Analysis undertaken by the Office of the Children’s Commissioner in 2023, for example, shows that any amount of holiday during term time is associated with lower GCSE results. We also know that absence for term-time holidays cannot be seen in isolation. Children inevitably miss some school due to childhood illnesses, and based on the most recent census data, a child who is taken out of school for a two-week holiday every year and has an average number of days off for sickness and medical appointments will have missed the equivalent of a full year of school by the time they finish year 11 at age 16. Let me repeat that: a child who takes a fortnight’s term-time holiday and has an average number of days off due to illness will miss a full school year over the course of their education.

I have spoken about how we are adopting an approach rooted in partnership and belonging, and I would like to highlight that term-time holidays do not impact only the child missing school. Children thrive on stability, and a steady churn of absences disrupts the learning of every child. The hard work by school staff to cultivate a sense of community and belonging is wasted, and teachers have to replan lessons, making it more difficult for them to cover the curriculum. Even if we assume that that takes just one minute per missed day, it adds up to the equivalent of 1,000 teachers working full-time on nothing else for an entire year. The impact of absence on other children is not spread equally; it hits the children who already face greater barriers to opportunity the hardest. Research by the National Foundation for Educational Research shows that in year groups where there was higher absence, disadvantaged pupils had worse attainment.

A number of hon. Friends and Members have raised points on children with SEND. We know that parents have struggled to get the right support for their children, particularly through the long and difficult EHCP process. We have announced extra funding for this year: over £1 billion to help schools with the additional costs that they face, including the costs of supporting their pupils with SEND. We will work across the sector to provide support for children with SEND and to restore parents’ trust.

We know that some pupils face more complex barriers to attendance. This can include pupils who have long-term physical or mental health conditions or special educational needs and disabilities. However, those children have the same right to an education as any other pupil. It is also worth noting that the national framework for penalty notices strengthens protections for SEND parents in, for example, absence cases other than holiday, including an expectation that attendance support will have been provided before a penalty notice is used. Our updated guidance on attendance includes more detail about additional support where a pupil is not attending due to unmet or additional needs. It sets out clear expectations on how schools, local authorities and wider services should work together to access and provide the right support to improve attendance.

A number of Members raised issues relating to holiday prices and term times. Of course, we recognise the concerns that they raised on behalf of their constituents about the cost of holidays at peak times. However, travel companies, airlines and hotels are private companies that set their prices based on their costs, competition and profit margins. The Government do not have the authority to dictate pricing strategies for private companies and businesses.

However, as has been mentioned, schools and local authorities have the flexibility to plan term dates, and to hold inset days and other occasional such days at less busy times of the year, which can help families to plan breaks at times that suit them. For example, I know of councils and school trusts, including in my constituency, that have trialled a two-week half term or slightly later summer holidays. Similar points were made by the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire (Ian Sollom). I stress that we are interested in anything more that holiday companies and other businesses in the sector can do to make holidays in peak times more affordable for families.

Several Members made remarks about penalty notices, which came into force following a national consultation. They are designed to embed our support-first approach and to improve consistency and fairness across the country, but they should always be used as a last resort. On bereavement, our guidance requires schools to take a support-first approach. Schools have the discretion to authorise a leave of absence in exceptional circumstances.

In conclusion, I once again thank all Members for their contributions. I acknowledge the strength of feeling behind them and that family holidays can be enriching activities, but we are not ashamed of the importance that we place on children attending school. Absence is one of the biggest barriers to success for children and young people. Minimising absence of any kind is crucial if we are to ensure that they reach their full potential, and we will continue to work in collaboration with the sector to take steps to achieve that.

17:22

[Dave Robertson]

I realise that I may have omitted to say how much of a pleasure it is to serve under your chairmanship at the start of the debate, Sir Edward. I am happy to correct the record in this instance.

Although we have had only a small number of speakers, the depth of research that has been done, and the depth of understanding of the issue across the Chamber by Members from the vast majority of parties has shown that this is being looked at by individual Members, the Government and all political parties. It has been a very good debate, in that we have heard a lot of different viewpoints, and it was good to hear the Minister’s response.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered e-petition 658365 relating to holidays during school term time.

17:22

Sitting adjourned.