Termtime holidays, father wins High Court case

[namechangeparents]

Quite surprised about the outcome actually but haven't read the legislation to see exactly what it says. Just hope lots of local authorities don't have to pay back fines now, because there will be even more cuts to services.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-36277940

Looks like an Education Act might be added to the Queen's Speech next week to resolve the issue rather than relying on the Court of Appeal maybe?

I suppose if you work somewhere like Alton Towers, it'll be all hands on deck during the holidays Barbarian. Maybe the same if you work for an airline or at Center Parcs?

Stanky You've hit the nail on the head. Exactly.

I'm a farmer with staff. Everyone gets at least one week off in the school holidays if they want it. I can't sometimes do more than that - harvest kind of gets in the way. There are more staff that want weeks than are available.

I'm constantly surprised how many people take children out of school for holidays. Would we do that if we had to pay the schools directly from our salaries the same we do for nurseries?

stanky you've summed it up exactly. I agree with you 100%. Life is short and it's tragic that so many people in the UK (and in other highly developed nations) are in such a poor state of mental health and are unable to find anything to enjoy about their lives.

We all need time to simply 'be'. There is more to life than work. Work has its place, an important place, but it shouldn't be the be all and end all of everything.

How many people reach the end of their lives with regrets? How many of those regrets include "I wish I had spent more time at work"? I suspect, not many. Far more likely it will be "I wish I had spent more time with my family" or "why did I never get around to doing all those things that I always said I wanted to do.. "

I said similar on this thread. www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/2636369-father-wins-high-court-case-against-60-fine-for-taking-his-DD-out-of-school?msgid=61050088#61050088 the Tory party are spreading misery.

I'm with Barbarian. Why are we accommodating inflexible employers over children's education? Even in tourism it should be possible to organise staffing so parents of school-age children get a week off.

We do need to look at spreading out holidays to make it easier for employers- no reason why those in Salford could not be slightly different from Manchester or Bury, for example. It would also make it a bit more difficult for holiday companies to always increase prices at school holiday time, if not all are the same everywhere.

The government however will not consider all this, just want to get their own back on the dad who has won his court case and change the law. If we leave the EU no doubt the right to four weeks holiday will come under threat too (notice how the fines were brought in under Michael Gove and Chris Grayling's time as Education and Justice Secretary, two campaigners to leave).

Has anyone got a link to this research that shows poor attendance or missing one day ruins life chances and lowers grades?

The trick is to not vote Tory again then.

The thing is, Stanky, we ARE revolving around work, work, work when we accept that employers can put blanket bans on employees who are parents having school-holiday time off and delegating the problem to schools (who will then be expected to deal with the disruption of having various kids off at various times). Surely our priority should be with continuity of children's education?

In the country I live in school holidays are staggered. Some states start their summer holiday towards the end of June, others towards the end of July. (It also rotates so that, mostly, each state has an early start for a couple of years, then a mid-start, then a late etc). This means that at any given time between say 20 June and 10 Sept, at least two or three states are on holiday. Some places have the first two weeks of Oct for half-term, others the last two. The effect of this is to make price increases in high season moderate (or, in some cases, make said season longer! But the big price hikes just don't happen here).

I don't know of any employers putting blanket bans on time off work during school holidays, but I do know a large number of the work force are parents of school age children. They can't all be granted time off in the holidays when your company need to cover the work. It can be a scramble to get that time off, and once so many people have claimed it, many others are missing out.

Don't let any body think about retiring either. You keep working until you drop, and then don't out stay your bloody welcome. We can't afford for people to retire and be hanging around.

I'm surprised by this particular case because they seem to have taken so many holidays! But overall I don't care if parents are taking children out for maybe 1-2 weeks a year. The problem is that low attendance triggers ofsted inspections and not in a good way! So as a teacher I would hope if the ruling was changed that holidays would be viewed differently on attendance records. Not sure how that would be possible though.
This whole ruling has made life awkward between parents and teachers. I have had some snotty letters from parents informing me that they're taking they're children on holiday- as though it's my fault that they aren't allowed too. I would love a holiday too but I can't afford one in the school holidays either, so I haven't been away in years.

Allowed to*

The headteacher at my childrens school always says that she doesn't mind children taking time off i term time in most circumstances but her hands are tied.
She's actually a good headteacher and really tries to stimulate the children and give them a sense of adventure. She's well travelled and adventurous herself so I guess that reflects in her style.
It's a good school and gets good results.

I do believe in working for a living and education btw. I just think that we have the balance all wrong when it comes to quality family time, and space to breathe.

Even my 8yo thinks that weeks go by quickly, and time seems to speed up as you get older, so his whole life is going to whizz by.

Before we know it, another 10 years has gone by. But I will get round to travelling and seeing the places I want to see one day. One day never seems to come. There's too much work to do.

If continuity of children's education is so important, why have a gap of 6 weeks every year?

I'm not arguing against the long break, by the way, just pointing out that continuity doesn't seem to be the only important consideration.

I agree with stanky. There is a very easy way to fix this, and the OFSTED inspection aspect.

Is there a group campaigning on this issue that we can support if we feel so moved?

Who are these employers who won't allow an adult to take any time off in school holidays?

You've hit on the military, although most Regiments these days have a summer and Xmas block leave period which means families can use school holidays.

DH has a friend whose wife is a GP. A year in advance she is given 2 two week periods by the Practice of when she has to take holidays, based on cover/locums etc. She gets fined every year but just sucks it up - their only issue with it is that they would prefer the fine was given to the school not the LA.

A friend of mine is a dentist. She is told she cannot take any holidays during the school hols as that is when they are busiest with pre-booked children's appointments. She does get compensated for it though (private practice, I expect things are different for NHS dentists)

As I said on the other thread I don't think this ruling is a cause for celebration. Thanks to this bloke the loopholes will now be closed/tightened. All he's done is make it worse for the actual struggling families (which he is most definately not).

Can you really not think of any business that has the summer as its busiest time and therefore cannot authorise holiday?

I'm surprised that so many poster's are agreeing with stanky who attests that people are 'so unhappy'.

I'm very sorry for people with depression but people are not generally unhappy/unhappier! What a strange and inaccurate generalisation.

I'm not a Tory voter and I object to this government's values. But we are individuals with choices and our own values and life paths - yes that is affected by laws and policies to a degree, but for most of us actually not that much. I work hard but my priorities are skewed towards family - I don't see myself as 'work work work'ing until I die as skanky said, Jeez.

And in many, many ways things are so much better for families nowadays then they used to be. When I had my daughters, I took 3 months off work each time. Now women routinely take a year off. Men have parental leave. More employers offer flexible working.

Even in tourism it should be possible to organise staffing so parents of school-age children get a week off.

Oh right, looks like you've solved that problem then. Have you rung the tourist industry yet to tell them?

Lemonade - perhaps you are a person who can afford peak rate holidays in the school holiday period? That might explain why you find it harder to empathise with Stanky's point.

Has anyone got a link to this research that shows poor attendance or missing one day ruins life chances and lowers grades?

www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/412638/The_link_between_absence_and_attainment_at_KS2_and_KS4.pdf

This is, I guess what the Government are basing their argument on. What it actually shows is that unless absence is persistent, attendance doesn't make a significant difference.

If the theory behind the correlation were correct then logically every child that attends every day would achieve A*s, those attending 97% A's... and so on.

Except, as we all know, attendance at school is not the only factor in attainment.

For instance, Figure 4 shows that 90.1% of children missing 40-45 days over KS4 still get 5 or more GCSEs at A*-C.