Home School Education Registration and Support Bill [HL]

Baroness Whitaker Excerpts

Friday 15th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Whitaker (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Storey, has form on this. I congratulate him on his determination, ever since he picked up the baton from my retired noble friend Lord Soley to rescue many vulnerable children. Despite the promises of the previous Government, nothing ever materialised, yet the number of children missing from school has clearly significantly increased, even though we do not know the exact number. So, alarmingly, has the number of children recruited on to county lines to deal in drugs under the intimidation and violence of criminal gangs. Was it not a dereliction of duty for the previous Government to abandon these children for so long without recognised education?

I should first say that it is still of prime importance to make it easier for all children to attend proper registered schools and thrive there. That has not always been so, and of course, as has been said, there have always been parents who educated their children at home well—often very well. Such parents have nothing to fear from the Bill, nor will the parents of children in registered religious schools. I hope that, in the interests of the large number of children who have massively missed out by being out of school, all parents will understand the need for the register.

This Bill will provide the lifeline of a proper education for some groups of children in particular. I first mention children of the Gypsy, Traveller and Roma communities, who drop out or are expelled or encouraged out of insufficiently inclusive schools in larger proportions than any other ethnic group. Their parents may have chosen home education because the bullying their children faced is intolerable, but they may not be equipped or have the time to home-educate properly.

However, there are also the children who have been made to attend those unregistered illegal schools whose narrow curricula and harsh punishments do not enable them to thrive. The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse found cases of physical and sexual abuse in some of those schools. This also needs to be dealt with

I have a few small concerns with the noble Lord’s Bill. In new Section 436D(1)(a), the obligation on parents to inform the local authority of home education may be impracticable for marginalised parents. Perhaps it should be the schools which inform the local authority, at least in the case of expulsion or the choice of elective home education. Also, I cannot work out what the difference is between new Section 436C(2)(j) and (k). That is only a detail, though.

Finally, a small number of families travel for work and in observance of cultural tradition, but local authority transit sites allow them to stop for only three months at a time, which disrupts their children’s education. They do not want that, but it predisposes them as a family to choose home education when they might not have the capacity. If the Department for Education were to continue its very welcome support for Open Doors Education & Training’s distance learning scheme, partnered with the Traveller Movement, this gap in home education could be filled. Can my noble friend guarantee that?

I hope that our Government can give this Bill a fair wind or provide their own version of its promise.