Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking with local authorities to identify children who are educated outside of school in Gloucester constituency.

The Children Not in School measures in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill will place a duty on local authorities, including Gloucester, to maintain compulsory registers of all children not in school in their areas, and accompanying duties on parents and out-of-school education providers to provide information for these registers. This will support local authorities to identify all children not in school in their areas, including children who are home educated, and to take action if they are not receiving a safe or suitable education.

The department is also continuing to work with local authorities to collect information from existing voluntary registers of children not in school. The department’s termly elective home education data collection is now mandatory for local authorities to submit a return, ensuring a more accurate national picture of home educated children. The department’s ‘Elective home education’ guidance for local authorities and parents includes advice for how local authorities should identify children not in school in their areas.