Question to the Department for Education:

To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to create a single national mandatory register of all children, including both those in, and not in, the school system.

The government has no current plans to create a national register of all children.

Using data to improve school attendance is central to the government’s mission to break down barriers to opportunity. Thanks to our world-leading data collection, the department has access to near real-time attendance data for mainstream schools, including academies.

As part of the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, the department is also introducing a requirement for every local authority in England and Wales to hold compulsory Children Not in School registers, and accompanying duties on parents to provide information for these registers. This will support local authorities to identify all children not in school in their areas.