Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Blake of Leeds Excerpts

Wednesday 28th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

Oh, well, all the time, then.

I will keep my remarks very brief. The noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, and my noble friend Lord Parkinson made a convincing case that children involved in performances should get special consideration in this area. I am not sure whether this is something I have to declare on the register, but my husband appeared in a drinking chocolate advert. I am ashamed to say that I just messaged him and, rather like my noble friend Lord Parkinson, he remembers exactly how much he was paid: £17 a day for two days and £200 for repeat broadcasts. My noble friend made the point very vividly: this means a huge amount to the children involved.

On the amendments tabled my noble friend Lord Wei, he will not be surprised to hear me say that the principles underpinning a register were in the previous Government’s Schools Bill and in the current Government’s manifesto, and we should respect that. Having said that, his Amendment 157A, even if it does not need formally to be in legislation, would be a very constructive way forward. I look forward to the Minister’s remarks.

[Baroness in Waiting/Government Whip (Baroness Blake of Leeds) (Lab)]

I feel that this group is becoming something of a confessional. It is very interesting to hear noble Lords’ backgrounds. The thing I love about this House is that noble Lords can bring their personal experiences, which makes the debate so rich. I expected it from the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, but it is very interesting to have other experiences coming into the Chamber.

This is a very important group of amendments about making sure that the registration system works, that it captures the appropriate children and that it does not in any way undermine young people’s ambitions. That is a very good point.

Amendments 127 and 129, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, would exclude all child performers from inclusion in the children not in school registers. I thank the noble Baroness for her productive engagement with the department and my noble friend the Minister on these issues that she obviously cares very passionately about. I think that she agrees that home-educated child performers should remain in scope of the registers. For that reason, we cannot accept the noble Baroness’s amendment, which would exclude all child performers from the registers. However, I am pleased to confirm that the Government intend to exclude school-registered child performers from the scope of the registers and will consult on this position as part of our wider consultation on the content of the regulations. I hope that that gives her the reassurance that she has been seeking in her conversations with us.

Amendment 130, also tabled by the noble Baroness, seeks to place a duty on local authorities to ensure that any children taking part in a performance, and who are not captured on the children not in school register, are registered under the existing child performance regulations. I appreciate the noble Baroness’s desire to ensure that children can take part in performance opportunities while also ensuring that appropriate safeguards are in place. The noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, made a very good point about making sure that all children can take up these incredible offers when they come along.

I reassure the noble Baroness that existing legislation already requires children undertaking certain performances and related activities to be licensed with the relevant local authority. That would remain the case regardless of whether a child was also registered on a children not in school register and, as such, this amendment is not required. We recognise the need to review child performance regulations, and the Government are committed to doing so, as was agreed when the noble Baroness met my noble friend the Minister and officials last September. This review will take account of her concerns, and I am sure that she will look forward to further evidence of that work coming forward. Putting children at the heart of everything we do throughout this legislation is central to our ambition to support young people in this country.

Government Amendment 128 seeks to clarify that children who attend school on agreed part-time arrangements can be included in the children not in school registers where they are also receiving education outside of a school setting. This amendment is necessary to ensure local authorities have oversight of those children and can be confident that their overall education is suitable.

Government Amendment 156 clarifies that a local authority may ask an out-of-school education provider to confirm whether they are providing education to children, whether or not those children live in the authority’s area. That will help local authorities identify children who are not recorded on registers but who should be. Not having this clarification risks a loophole where registration is avoided simply by sending children to providers outside their home authority.

Government Amendment 157 also clarifies how the provider duty will work in practice. The amendment would clarify that providers subject to the duty need to give information only on children living in England and Wales. We recognise that there are providers that have significant online or international offerings that may be captured by the duty on out-of-school education providers. As the children not in school registers apply only to children in England and Wales, it would be inappropriate for local authorities to receive details of children outside of these countries.

Amendment 157A, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wei, seeks to require the Secretary of State to publish annual anonymised statistics on the operation of the registers and school attendance orders. We already publish annual anonymised statistics on home-educated children and school attendance orders drawn from local authorities’ voluntary registers. I emphasise that, once the children not in school registers are implemented, the department intends to continue doing so; where this would not identify individuals, it will also publish the number of complaints and appeals, along with their outcomes.

Amendments 148C and 161B were tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wei—the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, added her name to the former; I do not want to leave her experience out of this. They would require the registers to be reviewed, their findings published, and for the registers to be re-approved by Parliament within a set timeframe. We will evaluate the impact of the registers following implementation and will communicate it to the House. It is unnecessary and inappropriate to create uncertainty for families and local authorities by placing sunset clauses in this legislation.

Amendment 161C, also tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wei, seeks to give parents an independent route of appeal to decisions made by a local authority under Sections 436B to 436G and to prevent local authority enforcement action where a parent has lodged an appeal, ombudsman complaint or judicial review, unless there is suspicion of harm to the child.

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Moved by

[Baroness Blake of Leeds]

144: Clause 32, page 59, line 41, leave out “within the further education sector”
Member's explanatory statement
This amendment would ensure that the register of children not in school would be required to contain information about all schools or institutions that a child attends or has attended in the past, including those which are institutions not in the further education sector.

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[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

The government amendments in this group seek to strengthen the support and engagement local authorities offer to families who wish to home educate. As my noble friend the Minister said during Committee, it is vital that local authorities build constructive relationships with parents. Such relationships are the most effective way for local authorities to understand a child’s education and circumstances and to identify any support families may want or require. The Department for Education is committed to fostering these partnerships wherever possible.

Government Amendment 144 would amend Section 436C(2)(j) to remove the specific reference to institutions in the further education sector. This would ensure that the department can require local authorities, via regulations, to record information about any education institution a registered child is attending or has attended in the past where the local authority has the information or can reasonably obtain it. Such information could be beneficial to include on registers because a history of establishments attended will give local authorities a clearer idea of the child’s circumstances and educational history. This understanding will enable the local authority to offer and provide more bespoke support to the child. For those parents who feel forced into home education, a record of previous schools attended would also give the local authority insight into which settings parents were dissatisfied with. Further analysis of this information could reveal where there may be gaps in support for parents within the school system, enabling the local authority or central government to take action.

Government Amendment 146 would make it clear that information on young carers may be prescribed for inclusion in children not in school registers. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Young, for raising this important matter in Committee, and the Carers Trust for its tireless work on ensuring that young carers are identified and supported. As my noble friend the Minister said in Committee, knowing whether a child is a young carer provides important context for an elective home education officer, both in assessing whether the child is receiving a full-time suitable education, and in ensuring that the family is signposted to any relevant support to which they are entitled. Prescribing this information for inclusion on the children not on school register would ensure that local authorities must record it if they can reasonably obtain it.

Turning to government Amendment 158, the department’s guidance is clear that when a parent elects to home-educate, they must be prepared to take full responsibility for their child’s education. This includes making arrangements for access to exams the child may wish to take. Local authorities should, however, be sources of advice for home-educating families. That is why we have tabled Amendment 158, would make it clear that local authorities must give advice and information about access to GCSE exams if requested by the parent of a home-educated child registered on their children not on school register. This advice could include signposting to local centres that may be open to taking private candidates; providing information on how to enter GCSEs as a private candidate; and signposting the Joint Council for Qualifications’ list of exam centres that accept private candidates, and organisations that provide guidance on exams or careers, such as Ofqual and the National Careers Service.

At a national level, the Department for Education will send communications to schools encouraging them to take private candidates and to join the list of centres held by the JCQ. We will engage with the JCQ to explore options for updating this list earlier in the year, ensuring that families have timely access to accurate information to support their planning.

Government Amendment 159 would require local authorities to hold forums with home-educating parents twice a year as part of their support duty, if there is an appetite on the part of parents for them to do so. These forums would be an opportunity for the community to provide feedback and to ask the local authority how the registered support duty and school attendance order process is operating. In turn, the forums would provide local authorities with a better understanding of the needs and views of home-educating families in their areas, laying the foundation for more constructive relationships.

Government Amendment 161 would ensure that the duty on local authorities to offer a biannual engagement forum is targeted specifically at home-educated parents. This would ensure that the forums remain focused on their core purpose. We know that some parents whose children are on a school roll or whose education is arranged by the local authority may also want the opportunity to speak directly to a representative from the local authority. However, where the issues relate to other duties, such as those under Section 19 of the Education Act 1996, those discussions are often highly technical or specific to an individual case. Such matters would not be well suited to an open forum of this kind, so those parents would be better supported through the existing routes of communication available to them. I beg to move.

[Lord Crisp (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak to my Amendment 160. As I did in the last group, I start by saying that I am grateful to the Minister and her colleagues for having moved in some way on the information provided about exams, and for setting up a forum; it will be interesting to see how that operates. I am also very sympathetic to Amendment 161A from the noble Lord, Lord Wei, in which he proposes setting up a proper forum where parents are asked to take some responsibility for the relationship. That seems quite a positive, and maybe a longer-term, way forward.

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[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

My Lords, His Majesty’s loyal Opposition are of the view that the government amendments seem entirely reasonable, and we therefore support them. While we understand the intentions behind the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Wei, we cannot support them. These issues were addressed in Committee by the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, and I will not repeat those arguments on Report.

Similarly with the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, we believe that local authorities simply do not have the capacity right now to be committing new funding, however small. So, while we understand the noble Lord’s intentions, we cannot support his amendment, but we welcome the opportunity to hear the response from the Government on the critical issues highlighted by all noble Lords thus far.

[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

I thank noble Lords for their very considered comments, particularly the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, for bringing his experience into the Chamber. I thank him for the considerate way that he has approached this. I hope we will continue to have a constructive dialogue as we move forward on these important issues.

Amendment 160, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, and Amendments 161A and 175ZC tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wei, seek to require local authorities to act supportively towards, and establish advisory boards of, home-educating families, and ensure that home-educated children can access examinations. As I said at the beginning of this group, local authorities should be sources of support for home-educating families. Noble Lords’ engagement has been constructive and I reassure them that this will be further strengthened by the support duty in the Bill, which is the first ever duty on local authorities to provide support specifically for home-educating families, as well as the government amendments in this group, which clarify that information on GCSE exam access should be provided as part of the support duty and require local authorities to arrange biannual engagement forums, as we have discussed.

We also recognise the importance of ensuring that parents are responsible for bearing the costs of any exams they may enter their child for before they make the decision to withdraw them from school. This is something already made clear in the department’s Elective Home-education guidance and which we would expect to be discussed as part of the mandatory meetings pilots that my noble friend described earlier. To expand on this, while some of these things seem straightforward, they are more involved than perhaps has been suggested. The question is: why can we not require local authorities to find exam centres for all home-educated students? This would involve a local authority forcing a state school or college to accommodate a home-educated pupil. We do not think this is right or appropriate. Exam centres, schools, colleges and private institutions rightly take their own decisions on whether they can accept private candidates based on their individual circumstances, such as financial and administrative capacity and logistical considerations. Schools and colleges have finite resources and exams must be delivered in line with strict regulatory requirements, including desk spacing, appropriate invigilator-to-candidate ratios and the secure administration of assessments to ensure that they are conducted fairly and safely. When a centre is able to accommodate a private candidate within these requirements, we fully encourage it to do so. However, it would not be appropriate to require a centre to breach exam regulations or compromise the integrity of the assessment, or to require a school with a full exam hall potentially to exclude one of their own pupils to make space for a private candidate. Instead, we encourage arrangements to be based on an understanding of each exam centre’s local circumstances and relationships.

However, the department will contact both state-funded and independent schools and colleges to encourage them to accept private candidates and to be included on the list of centres published by the JCQ, as appropriate. To pick up on the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Russell, we will also work with the JCQ to explore whether this list can be made available earlier in the year so that families have timely and accurate information to support their planning.

In addition, we will update our guidance to local authorities, encouraging them to provide clear and accessible information for home-educating families at an early stage about the qualifications and exam centres in their area. This will help families to consider exam arrangements before starting a course of study, make informed choices about assessment options and avoid unnecessary travel, where possible.

[Lord Wei (Con)]

I welcome this timely provision of information for families. I speak for myself, but Peers here have also spoken about the need for exam access and would not want to burden state or other schools that have completely full exam halls. I wonder whether, maybe through a letter, we could have a further conversation with the department about this.

As that information is gathered and you discover what access there is in a local authority, if there literally is none for exams, could there not be some dialogue with the local schools? This would not be to force them to do anything they cannot do, or cannot afford to do, but just to ask how many spare desks they have in their exam halls, which they probably will be able to tell you very quickly. Then, that will allow conversations to happen about creating something in the area, which often may be absent, as we found.

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[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for that intervention. This is exactly what we are proposing: there needs to be that dialogue, to have a better understanding of what is—or is not—available locally. The noble Lord mentioned his own circumstance, having to travel a long distance. Perhaps if he had been able to have a conversation about which exam boards operate in his local area, that might have made a difference.

That situation, of the offer from different exam boards, is unique to England, which obviously means different syllabuses—which has an impact. The earlier conversations we are proposing will hopefully bring that out. It is difficult to be too prescriptive at this point, because of the different circumstances in different localities. It is for those areas to make clear what provision they are able to make.

In relation to Amendment 175ZC, it is also important to highlight that the Equality Act 2010 already places a statutory duty on awarding organisations to provide reasonable adjustments for disabled students in exams and assessments. This applies to all learners, irrespective of whether they attend a school or are home-educated. I hope that answers the point the noble Lord, Lord Wei, raised about equalities.

Amendment 175ZA, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wei, seeks to ensure that home-educated children and families are not unfairly disadvantaged or subjected to additional administrative and evidential requirements. Of course, we agree that home-educating families and children should not be unfairly disadvantaged. However, the reality is that many services are accessible to children through their school. When a family makes the choice to electively home-educate, they are opting out of this system. This is why our guidance is clear that parents should ensure that they are fully informed about home education before they enter into it. There are existing duties under equalities law to ensure that organisations do not discriminate, and our guidance is clear that any request for evidence must be proportionate. Private businesses, such as many education providers and examination centres, must retain autonomy over who their services are available to, as long as they comply with the law.

Amendment 175ZB, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wei, seeks to require the Secretary of State to issue guidance on the training of local authority officers on the children not in school measures. I am happy to reassure the noble Lord that we will be developing the training package for local authorities, focused on their new duties. This training will be co-developed with and co-delivered by home education representatives, and we will engage with relevant stakeholders, including our implementation forums, and safeguarding and domestic abuse organisations, on the materials to be included in this package.

With these comments, I therefore hope the changes the Government are proposing have addressed noble Lords’ concerns. I also thank the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, for his comments and explanation of the position he is taking.

Amendment 144 agreed.