Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to page 13 of the IPPR report, Making The Difference: Breaking the link between school exclusion and social exclusion, what assessment she has made of the implications for her policies of the findings that the number of pupils educated in schools for excluded pupils is five times higher than the number of officially permanently excluded pupils.

We will look closely at the findings of the IPPR report which was published on 10 October 2017.

The Department’s exclusion guidance is clear that any decision to exclude a pupil should be lawful, reasonable and fair. While exclusion can be used as a sanction for schools to deal with poor behaviour, permanent exclusion should only be used as a last resort, in response to a serious breach, or persistent breaches, of the school’s behaviour policy.

As announced by the Prime Minister on 10 October 2017, the Department plans to take forward an external review of exclusions practice, focused on the experience of those groups who are disproportionately likely to be excluded.