Schools: Clothing

(asked on 24th June 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many local authorities offer a school clothing grant.


Answered by
Nick Gibb Portrait
Nick Gibb
This question was answered on 29th June 2020

In England, some local authorities provide discretionary grants to help with buying school uniforms. The local authorities which offer these grants set their own criteria for eligibility. The Department does not collect figures on the number of local authorities that offer uniform grants. In addition, schools may also offer individual clothing schemes, such as offering secondhand uniform at reduced prices; this would be a decision for the school to make.

No school uniform should be so expensive as to leave pupils or their families feeling unable to apply to, or attend, a school of their choice, due to the cost of the uniform. As such the Department supports the Education (Guidance about Costs of School Uniforms) Private Members’ Bill, to make our guidance regarding the cost considerations for school uniform statutory.

The Department’s current non-statutory guidance is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/school-uniform.

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