Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answers of 14 October 2024 to Question 7569 on Special Educational Needs and Question 7570 on Pupil Referral Units, how many and what proportion of children who had been excluded from school were then registered at Pupil Referral Units by (a) sex, (b) ethnicity, (c) free school meals status and (d) region in each of the last 10 years.

The department does not currently hold statistics showing how many children who had been excluded from school were then registered at Pupil Referral Units. However, there are legal duties on schools and local authorities to provide suitable full-time education from the sixth day of a suspension or permanent exclusion.

The duties on schools and local authorities to provide alternative provision, and the standards that this should meet, are also set out in statutory guidance. This guidance can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/alternative-provision.