Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what data her Department holds on the number of prosecutions of parents under section 444 of the Education Act 1996 where the child had an Education, Health and Care Plan at the time the prosecution was initiated.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Data for prosecution of offences in England, including offences for non-attendance, is collected by the Ministry of Justice. The Department for Education does not collect data on the protected characteristics of the children of individuals who have been prosecuted for an offence related to their child’s non-attendance at school. Nevertheless, we recognise that pupils with special educational needs and disabilities may face more complex barriers to school attendance and we expect schools to take a ’support first’ approach to tackling non-attendance for these pupils.
The department’s statutory guidance on attendance makes clear that legal intervention, including prosecution, should only be considered where support has been exhausted, not engaged with or, in the cases of term-time holidays, is not appropriate. The guidance sets out clear expectations on how schools, local authorities and wider services should work together to support attendance for all children.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many prosecutions of parents under section 444 of the Education Act 1996 were brought in each of the last three years.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Data for prosecution of offences in England, including offences for non-attendance, is collected by the Ministry of Justice. The Department for Education does not collect data on the protected characteristics of the children of individuals who have been prosecuted for an offence related to their child’s non-attendance at school. Nevertheless, we recognise that pupils with special educational needs and disabilities may face more complex barriers to school attendance and we expect schools to take a ’support first’ approach to tackling non-attendance for these pupils.
The department’s statutory guidance on attendance makes clear that legal intervention, including prosecution, should only be considered where support has been exhausted, not engaged with or, in the cases of term-time holidays, is not appropriate. The guidance sets out clear expectations on how schools, local authorities and wider services should work together to support attendance for all children.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what data her Department holds on the number of prosecutions of parents under section 444 of the Education Act 1996 where the child was receiving SEN Support at the time the prosecution was initiated.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Data for prosecution of offences in England, including offences for non-attendance, is collected by the Ministry of Justice. The Department for Education does not collect data on the protected characteristics of the children of individuals who have been prosecuted for an offence related to their child’s non-attendance at school. Nevertheless, we recognise that pupils with special educational needs and disabilities may face more complex barriers to school attendance and we expect schools to take a ’support first’ approach to tackling non-attendance for these pupils.
The department’s statutory guidance on attendance makes clear that legal intervention, including prosecution, should only be considered where support has been exhausted, not engaged with or, in the cases of term-time holidays, is not appropriate. The guidance sets out clear expectations on how schools, local authorities and wider services should work together to support attendance for all children.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to monitor the proportion of prosecutions of parents under section 444 of the Education Act 1996 that involve children with special educational needs and disabilities.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Data for prosecution of offences in England, including offences for non-attendance, is collected by the Ministry of Justice. The Department for Education does not collect data on the protected characteristics of the children of individuals who have been prosecuted for an offence related to their child’s non-attendance at school. Nevertheless, we recognise that pupils with special educational needs and disabilities may face more complex barriers to school attendance and we expect schools to take a ’support first’ approach to tackling non-attendance for these pupils.
The department’s statutory guidance on attendance makes clear that legal intervention, including prosecution, should only be considered where support has been exhausted, not engaged with or, in the cases of term-time holidays, is not appropriate. The guidance sets out clear expectations on how schools, local authorities and wider services should work together to support attendance for all children.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what guidance her Department has issued to local authorities on the application of discretion in attendance enforcement proceedings against parents of children with special educational needs and disabilities.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Data for prosecution of offences in England, including offences for non-attendance, is collected by the Ministry of Justice. The Department for Education does not collect data on the protected characteristics of the children of individuals who have been prosecuted for an offence related to their child’s non-attendance at school. Nevertheless, we recognise that pupils with special educational needs and disabilities may face more complex barriers to school attendance and we expect schools to take a ’support first’ approach to tackling non-attendance for these pupils.
The department’s statutory guidance on attendance makes clear that legal intervention, including prosecution, should only be considered where support has been exhausted, not engaged with or, in the cases of term-time holidays, is not appropriate. The guidance sets out clear expectations on how schools, local authorities and wider services should work together to support attendance for all children.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what process her Department has in place to help ensure that Plan 2 student loan borrowers are informed of any changes made to their repayment terms.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The Student Loans Company (SLC) publishes confirmation of the interest rates and repayment threshold to apply in the upcoming financial year annually on GOV.UK. Furthermore, SLC have extensive guidance on the operation of the student loan repayments system available on GOV.UK.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of access to educational psychologists in schools.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
Educational psychologists (EPs) play a critical role in supporting children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). However, their capacity is often limited by high volumes of statutory assessments, compounding local authorities’ struggles with recruitment and retention.
This is why the department is investing £26 million to train at least 200 EPs per year in 2026 and 2027, followed by further investment from 2028 to expand this training scheme, subject to future spending review. After graduation, these EPs will be required to work within a local authority in England for at least three years. This investment will help to ensure that more EPs are available to provide support, including strengthening inclusive mainstream, identifying and supporting needs earlier, and bolstering capacity to deliver assessments.
We will strengthen mainstream education settings’ capability by providing access to universal and targeted support from key services, including EPs. We want more opportunities for EPs to work in mainstream settings to support children with SEND, and we are providing around £1.8 billion over the next three years for local area partnerships, including local authorities and integrated care boards, to work together to develop a new ‘Experts at Hand’ offer.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many parents have been prosecuted for their child's non-attendance at school in each quarter of the last five years.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
The department does not hold data on the total number of parents that have been prosecuted for their child’s non-attendance as this is a matter for the courts. However, our statutory guidance is clear that schools should take a ‘support first’ approach to pupils’ attendance and prosecutions should only be used as a last resort, where all other routes have been exhausted or deemed inappropriate in the circumstances of the individual case.
A new national framework for penalty notices came into effect from August 2024 designed to embed our support-first approach and improve consistency and fairness across the country. Data collected by the department from the first year of the new framework (the 2024/25 academic year) shows 148 cases reported where a parent was prosecuted due to reaching the limit of two penalty notices within three years. Comprehensive data on prosecution offences is collected by the Ministry of Justice.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the (a) potential impact of accrued interest on the total debt balances of Plan 2 borrowers and (b) number of graduates whose monthly repayments are lower than the monthly interest added to their account.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
As monthly repayment amounts for individual borrowers can change from month to month, it is not possible to produce a reliable monthly level figure. On an annual basis, the number of England-domiciled borrowers with Plan 2 loans which have become liable to repay where the sum of all interest amounts accrued is greater than the sum of all repayment amounts in the 2024/25 financial year, to the nearest 10,000, was 3.32 million. This includes all maintenance, tuition and advanced learner loans and includes borrowers who are currently earning below repayment threshold.
Unlike commercial loans, student loan repayments are linked to income, not to the amount borrowed or interest applied. Borrowers only start repaying their student loan once earnings exceed the threshold, after which they repay at a rate of 9% of income above the repayment threshold, meaning low earning borrowers are protected. At the end of the repayment term the majority of Plan 2 borrowers, other than those with sufficiently high earnings to repay their loan in full, will have any outstanding loan debt, including interest accrued, cancelled with no detriment to the borrower and debt is never passed on to family members of descendants.
Asked by: Claire Young (Liberal Democrat - Thornbury and Yate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of maintaining thresholds for Plan 2 student loan repayments on trends in the level of repayments made by graduates; and what discussions she has had with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the potential impact of maintaining this threshold on the marginal effective tax rate for graduates earning above that threshold.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department produced the following analysis regarding the impact of maintaining the repayment and interest thresholds for Plan 2 student loans on the lifetime repayments made by borrowers:
Average lifetime repayments (2024/25 financial year prices) | |||||
Baseline (£) | Post- policy (£) | Impact | |||
£ | % | ||||
Entire cohort | 27,000 | 28,300 | 1,300 | 5 | |
Average | |||||
Lifetime graduate earnings decile | 1 | 2,000 | 2,000 | 0 | 0 |
2 | 4,300 | 4,700 | 400 | 9 | |
3 | 7,700 | 8,100 | 400 | 5 | |
4 | 11,600 | 13,000 | 1,400 | 12 | |
5 | 16,900 | 18,500 | 1,600 | 9 | |
6 | 23,100 | 25,200 | 2,100 | 9 | |
7 | 31,300 | 33,600 | 2,300 | 7 | |
8 | 41,200 | 43,500 | 2,300 | 6 | |
9 | 54,500 | 56,100 | 1,600 | 3 | |
10 | 59,100 | 59,500 | 400 | 1 | |
The department will release an equalities impact assessment, including the impact on lifetime repayments, alongside other borrower impacts for the Plan 2 repayment threshold and interest threshold freeze announced at the Autumn Budget. Published results may differ from those provided due to model and data updates.
The rate of repayment for undergraduate student loans remains at 9% on all income above the relevant threshold. Other factors, including any reliefs, pension contributions, or receipt of certain means-tested welfare benefits could adjust an individual’s effective tax rate.