Holiday fines for taking kids out of school, is the government missing the point?

[Supersares]

With the government announcing today they’re increasing the fine from £60 to £80 per parent, does anyone else think the government is missing the point here? I assume that the reason most parents have holidays during term time is to avoid the extortionate cost of going during the 6 week summer break. Wouldn’t it be better to clamp down on holiday companies hiking their charges instead… or am I missing something?

If the sick day was followed by the holiday, as in 5 consecutive days, I would be assumed and treated as all five were holiday.

@TheBottomsOfMyTrousersAreRolled

But if the sick day was 6 months ago it wouldn't be an issue?

No im pretty sure it is consecutive days. However, the third fineable becomes a court issues under new rules by the looks of it

Yep. Or schools that refuse to meet a child's needs and then gaslight and blame the parent for safeguarding them and keeping them at home. Schools causing children to miss months of school when the child wants to go but is being denied safe access to education. And then they have the audacity to be moaning if another child misses a few days for a holiday! What a joke.

The training days do not affect the number of days your children have in school. Your child gets 190 days per year regardless of the number of training days.

February half term isn't seasonal!

Also, as a teacher I am ok with children having a holiday on term time if they have good attendance and are making progress.

Before teaching I took my own children out and we got fined. I appealed the fine as my daughter was in year 7 and received headteacher award. I appealed as I said it had clearly not affected her education and they dropped the fine.

In our LA, the fine has to be requested within a term or 12 weeks of the absence otherwise the Council say the parents might challenge the fact that the fine was issued too long after the absence.
All the money from the fine goes to the Local authority to cover 'admin' costs of issuing the fine when in actual fact the school making the request do all the admin, send in all the details of the absence, the request from parents, the refusal by the school, the attendance percentage and certificate of said student.
Ofsted requires action against poor attendance, schools may not necessarily want to issue fine requests because they know their students, in most cases they understand why a child is consistently absent but they're left with no choice.

It encourages dishonesty - people get their children to lie to avoid these fines.

The fines would have to be ££££'s to actually be a deterrent and make it more expensive holidaying in term time.

Give everyone 1 week to take when they like, provided general attendance is good and they agree to do some catch up work at home.

We've been honest, paid the fines, had some amazing family holidays (including extended family) and as DS1 is predicted a batch of 9, 8 and 7s for GCSE's it hasn't effected his educational attainment.

I do understand that low attendance overall is a risk, but the children I know whose education has been impacted have been out for genuine ill health, whether physical or mental and for considerably more than 1 week a year.

Yes it is. Prices probably change a bit less in Feb than in May, but it’s still seasonal.

If summer is equivalent to peak time fares at commuting times Monday to Friday, Feb is the slightly cheaper ticket you can get after 0930 but non-school-holiday weeks are the evening out returns after 4pm.

but Still makes the overall holiday cheaper than going during school holidays

The fines don’t start until the child has misses 10 consecutive sessions, so 5 full days. Or, in my LA anyway it’s 7 days (14 consecutive sessions) over 2 consecutive terms.

Most parents will happily pay the fine as it’s cheaper than the school holidays prices.

I will be taking my DDs out in term time, just like last year, they will go to school Monday morning and will then be off the rest of the week, so will only be gone for 9 sessions and no fine to pay. The school know we are on holiday and don’t have a problem with it. High school on the other hand I’ve not spoken to, I suspect they won’t be as relaxed.

I feel being able to go away as a family, enjoy activities and make holiday memories is far more important than missing 5 days of school, especially in summer term where there isn’t much going on.

Its easy for people with money to say if you can’t afford to pay term time prices that’s life you miss out.

Last year we did 2 holiday, same camp site sane number of days in same standard caravan, term time and summer holiday, the 2nd holiday was over 4 times what we paid in term time and my DCs didn’t do any activities as they were completely booked up. This year we will be just doing the term time holiday and using the rest of the money for days out during the summer holidays.

Sorry should have said, each LA is different in how they enforce fines. Ours is £60/parent per child which is reduced if the fine paid early and increases if not paid on time. Eventually parents are taken to court if they don’t pay fines and in extreme cases I believe there have been custodial sentances.

We just take a shorter holiday if we need to. Schools important, DD is really not struggling at all (few years ahead) but I don’t want her to think any of this is optional. It’s not just missing out on the specific work (which tbh won’t make much difference to her) it’s also about the culture of commitment, always work first then play.

I read posts like this though and then I think of all the parents up in arms that they might have to pay VAT on school fees(!) my heart bleed 🙃 it's people like that who don't have any empathy for those who can't go on holiday.

It costs much more than an extra £100. A holiday that you can get for £2500 in May can cost £7500 in August. It's a massive difference.

It is for skiing…

yes, you are missing lots of things. Holiday companies dont hike their charges in school holidays. What they do is drop them off peak. And it is nothing to do with the government

And on other hand travellers can withdraw kids from school at 11 yrs old with no fine , no checks , nada

This causes such frustration. I know for us as a family, when our DS’ were in education no way could we have afforded an overseas holiday during school holidays, the price was just too prohibitive. We always made sure our two, only missed 2/3days from end of term, this gave us a better price, and did not trigger a fine.

I am going back a few years now, but when I was at school, it was standard that schools (England)would allow upto 10 days absence for holidays, this could be taken together for a fortnight or two separate weeks, this system worked well for families, particularly those that could only take holidays at certain times of the year etc. no fines whatsoever then.

I can see schools getting tougher on term time holidays, I know the fines will increase soon, some European countries are much harsher on termtime holidays.

https://www.euronews.com/travel/2024/03/27/travelling-during-school-time-here-are-the-fines-parents-could-face-across-europe

Anyone can opt to home educate their kids and they are not fined. HTH.

Contrary to common belief, there has never been a time when parents were allowed to take children out of school for 10 days for holidays. The previous system used to allow up to 10 days in special circumstances. This was intended to cover, for example, families where one or both parents were in roles that required them to take any holidays during term time. It was never a general right, although many people believed it was.

@prh47bridge but in the 90s things like fines didn't even exist. In fact nobody even batted an eye lid. What really irks. ME is the way many dress pulling your child out of school is about the child's welfare and education 🙄🙄

In the 90s, enforcement involved taking parents to court where they could face a fine or imprisonment. This was rare, and many parents prosecuted didn't turn up in court. Fines were introduced by the Blair government due to clear evidence that children who were taken out of primary school for term time holidays were more likely to play truant at secondary school, and also due to evidence that higher absence rates damage educational outcomes and lead to increased likelihood of involvement in youth crime.

These increased prices apply to teachers as well. Surely they should be able to take holiday time during term.

I haven't read all the comments but the ones I have read, oh what an 'entitled' world we live in!