To think that people just don't get supply and demand

[bottlenecker]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26093691

If airports are currently running at capacity then how can lowering taxes on flights help people get a cheaper holiday.

If families are currently willing to pay current high prices for holidays, then reducing taxes will surely lead to holiday companies being able to hike prices even further because people do seem to be able to afford them at the current rate.

Why do people not seem to understand the basics of supply and demand. If people couldn't afford the current costs of holidays to fill seats on the planes then holiday companies would have to put their prices down. They are full though

bitoutofpractice

Well done

I'm likewise having a hard time believing a child would would be denied leave for a funeral.

Hard to answer fully without outing myself, but in general terms....

Do all your family expect you to do all the running around if you go over the the US?

I don't have the brass to insist they drop everything & have a random family reunion because I deign to grace their country. I guess that we could hire a venue, the "lljkk comes to visit once every 4 years" party.

Could they not meet you at the granny's.

Not the ones who descend from my grandfather only (bitter divorce from the granny in 1947). Or the masses on my mother's side. Of course I could accommodate by hiring an extra big venue. Would need to be organised like a wedding. Maybe we could set it up as bring-a-dish-to-share, I wonder who would drive several hours for that as a random event.

Could you not go at Easter when it's not so hot?

Long list of too personal details to answer that, but the bottom line is I tried to and failed (very high demand destinations!), there is already a controversial-so-no-one-goes family event on Easter I don't want to get tangled in those politics, and even an Easter visit still means missed school for the costs to be remotely worthwhile. Who would pay £5-6k for a spaced-out jet lagged week away followed by another full week of jet lag; actually, DD's teacher did this when he went on Honeymoon in Bali (he missed 2 days of teaching).

bottlenecker and crowler there have been a number of threads on here where people have been told they cannot take their child out for a funeral unless it is a close relative which has been defined by the h/t as grand parent, parent or sibling. there is one somewhere (cant find it at the moment) where it was an aunt who was like a grandmother and the poster needed the Friday off and was sent a standard letter reminding her that absences should be planned better. the poster wanted to write back that she would be reminding all elderly relatives in future only to die at the beginning of school hols so they could be buried before schools returned. you would hope that schools would be sympathetic but some are taking a really dogmatic line I am afraid. and this is the problem. post code lottery as to whether your time off is authorised or not.

I'm a teacher and my daughter and I just had a different half term. The 2 holidays, one with each parent, mentioned up thread is really not a solution to that one. If you split holidays across regions, prices will be increased for even more weeks of the year. This doesn't just impact on families. Lots of people have to take holidays during school holidays even if they don't gave children. They still pay the inflated prices.

Of course they can go to a funeral. It really means that they can have the same time off as a teacher.
A teacher can go to a funeral- a teacher can't have a week off because holiday prices are cheaper.

Lots of families would be badly affected if you had staggered holidays- a mad idea!

I never had such a thing as a foreign holiday when I was a child.
I remember spending all the school holidays playing outside. In fact watching "Call the midwife" and seeing the children playing in the street around the washing lines brings it all back. I am old.

When I was first married and had my children we didn't go abroad.
I think this obsession with expensive holidays just adds to everybody's stress.

I have never had a problem WRT funerals or visiting sick (terminally ill) realtives.

I am really enjoying developing Bottlenecker's idea fully. This is what we should have done:

Sep-Oct 2013: online perusal only probably, find venues for a big "lljkk came to the country" party

Nov 2013: book somewhere within 2 hour drive of most people, send out invites & RSVP schedule to about 50 households (expect max 30 households to RSVP yes). Probably provide all the food, since they are paying for travel costs. People living more than 2 hours drive away probably won't come due to high hotel costs. Finalise food & other details. Do I need to book entertainment, a DJ?, or is just hanging out good enough? No dress code.. or should I? Book it maybe 1-5pm. Cost has got to be at least $1000 without entertainment, but depends who shows up

Friday 4th April: last day of term,

Sat 5th: travel to London & transatlantic flight (£4k) in digs that might cost a mere $1000-$1500 for 9 days if my dad knows the owners again.

Sun 6th: up at 3am with jet lag, any waking time spent glazed over, not safe to drive hours & hours in any direction

Mon 7th-Thurs10th: still up at absurd hours, try to relax & visit with close family, make sure all plans ready for big party

Friday 11th: finally ready for some kind of organised outing

Sun 13th: big party! People keep saying "But why didn't you come for X day instead....?" and me trying to explain how strict English schools are.

Mon 14th: pack, prep to come home, fly on evening flight

Tues 15th: arrive in London, 4 hours to get home from there

Weds 16th-Mon 21st: recover from jet lag

Tues 22nd: start of summer term.

Yup, not impossible. Absurdly poor value for money, but not impossible.

Summer activities would look similar but could stay longer if I could afford it.

Actually staggered school holidays have been normal in my home-region for decades now, I will ask my cousins how it works. Keep in mind that hardly anyone has much vacation time, so the difficult issue there is childcare.

If children are denied authorised absences to attend funerals just because their HT does not deem the relationship to be 'close' enough then that is worth campaigning against. Not holiday prices.

lljkk Im sorry if I offended you with my post I just meant that it seems unfair if we could only take ds during holidays when its so much more expensive when the purpose of the visit is to see my family and spend some time altogether, yes I can see its a luxury but I miss them, and being priced out if visits makes me . I probably didnt explain it well.

Thing is when your kids have disappeared to UNI and wherever else, you will be glad of the cheaper holidays on offer.

It's always been this way. I'm not sure why it's only making the news now.

I don't know why it is suddenly making news. We have had 23 years of holidays at the most expensive times and suddenly we can go in September etc and get cheap offers. It comes to everyone in the end!

I suppose it is in the news because it was allowed - however I wouldn't have done it.

I think people have been lulled into a false sense of what they should be able to afford.

You're not as rich as you think you are, people!

Surely most people would still want July and August for the better weather in many popular countries? It's a daft idea to interfere with prices because as someone said earlier what next demand Alton Towers etc are not more expensive in peak season etc etc.

I just don't get the debate. Holidays abroad are a luxury, not a human right ffs! Holidays were during the summer in caravan in every year, until I turned 14 and used a passport for the first time.

Am speaking from a position of not being able to afford a holiday at any time, whatever the 'rules' anyway, so guess am just jealous and bitter.

I just don't get the debate. Holidays abroad are a luxury, not a human right ffs! Holidays were during the summer in caravan in every year, until I turned 14 and used a passport for the first time.

Am speaking from a position of not being able to afford a holiday at any time, whatever the 'rules' anyway, so guess am just jealous and bitter.

They'll never get the teachers to agree to changing term times so that different areas have different holiday dates. My local authority mooted the idea of changing to a five term system. There were all sorts of very good arguments for doing this including improving educational standards in a very deprived area where it was demonstrated that the children lost out on a educational basis and a welfare basis by being out of school for 6-7 weeks during the summer.

The teachers went ballistic and the vast majority complained about the fact that their term times might not be the same as their children's term times since their children invariably went to schools in a different county/area. There would only have been about two weeks that were any different to anywhere else.

I have just been reading the debate on line. here's a great quote from one of the committee:

".....On the statistical evidence, the measures in question are a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Before the rules changed, authorised family holidays accounted for 7.5% of all absences in primary schools, which works out at 0.4% of all sessions missed. This has been mentioned before, but the figure goes down to 2.5% when a child goes to secondary school, because parents recognise the additional importance of their children’s education as they progress—that translates into 0.1% of all sessions missed. Are those therefore the families whom we should be penalising?

Absence for family holidays is lower among those who are the parents of persistently absent pupils. That is another thought—the family holiday parents are not the same as the irresponsible parents who allow their children not to attend school. We need to have some sense of proportion....."

That's right everyone 0.1% of the sessions missed were due to authorised family holidays. so what about the other 99.9% eh? what is being done to tackle that. I am gobsmacked by these figures. anyone after seeing this who doesn't think this legislation was wrong - well I hold my hands up.

Mr Mudie MP gets it right "....The measure was peremptorily introduced, smuggled through the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments......" with no consultation. The MP's didn't even know it was going on.

My thoughts exactly, i do get a bit well...not mad but frustrated that people don't understand that we live in a demand led economy. If everything cost the same, our society would change on so many levels. it would be like communism in a way as businesses standards would drop- they wouldn't need to worry about high standards and customer service.

I think the gov rule is a bit harsh. i remember my parents took me out of school for a holiday for 2 weeks- still got GCSEs, A-levels and went to university and got a 1st. i think there needs to be a limit on it obviously though and not around assessment times.

My DS1 is 13 and a half. Never been abroad, longest holiday one night in a static caravan. Day trips loads of places. We are MC, I guess, he has two university graduate parents. He seems to be doing OK on never having flown. DS2 is only one and a half - down the lane to see the sheep is still exciting to him :)

why are we and Gove concentrating on the 0.1% of absences rather than the 99.9%?