Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to help tackle persistent school absences.

Persistent absence is a post-pandemic challenge which is affecting schools around the world. With the standards of schools continuing to rise, the benefits of this success can only be felt when all children are in school.

The department knows that persistent absence is often a symptom of other problems. Progress has already been made with 380,000 fewer children persistently absent or not attending in the 2022/23 academic year than in 2021/22. The department’s comprehensive strategy to improve attendance continues to tackle this attendance challenge.

The department has published new, stronger guidance setting out the expectations for schools, academy trusts and local authorities to work together to improve attendance. To make it easier for schools and local authorities to identify pupils at risk of becoming persistently absence, a new attendance data tool to has also been piloted with 88% of state-funded schools currently involved.

This year, the department will introduce 18 new attendance hubs, bringing the total to 32 and 2,000 schools supported to tackle persistent absence. Attendance hubs involve several leading schools sharing practical solutions with others to break down barriers to attendance. From direct pupil engagement initiatives, like breakfast clubs and extracurricular activities, to improving other schools’ processes and analysis, these hubs are already making a real difference, with more than one million pupils being supported into regular education.

The department is also expanding the three-year mentoring programme to tackle absenteeism. Backed by an additional investment of £15 million, this programme provides direct intensive one-to-one support to 10,000 persistent and severely absent pupils and their families. From September 2024, attendance mentors will work in a further ten areas. These areas are in addition to the existing pilot programme with Barnardo’s, which is already operating in Middlesbrough, Doncaster, Knowsley, Salford, and Stoke on Trent.

Ten newly appointed expert attendance advisers have also played an important role in supporting local authorities and a number of multi-academy trusts with higher levels of persistent absence to review their current practice and develops plans to improve.

Alongside these measures, the department is investing:

• Almost £2.9 billion this financial year in the Pupil Premium, which can be used to support attendance.
• £2.6 billion between now and 2025 on the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities and Alternative Provision improvement plan.
• £200 million per annum in the holiday activities and food programme.
• £30 million in the national school breakfast programme.
• An additional £200 million in the supporting families programme, which specifies improved attendance.