Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the role school-specific uniform plays in promoting a sense of identity within schools and their local communities.

The Department strongly encourages schools to have a school uniform. We recognise the valuable role it can play in contributing to the ethos of a school and setting an appropriate tone.

It is for the governing body of a school (or in the case of academies, the academy trust) to decide whether there should be a school uniform and what it will be.

When deciding upon a school uniform policy and considering how the school uniform should be sourced, governing bodies should give highest priority to the consideration of cost and value for money for parents. Governing bodies should be able to demonstrate that they have obtained the best value for money from suppliers.

The Government is pleased to support the recently introduced Private Member’s Bill to ‘Make provision for guidance about the cost aspects of school uniform policies.’ It will place a duty on the Secretary of State for Education to issue statutory guidance pertaining to the cost aspects of school uniform policies. We intend to consider the views of a full range of stakeholders when developing this statutory guidance.