Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the Department for Education's press release entitled Major national drive to improve school attendance, published on 8 January 2024, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of this policy on children with long term conditions.

Improving attendance remains a top priority for the department. This is why it has launched a national communications campaign to remind families that “moments matter, attendance counts”.

The campaign reflects feedback from schools and local authorities and aims to primarily reach those parents whose children are taking preventable odd days of absence, or “avoidable absence”. It builds on NHS guidance and messages from the Chief Medical Officer’s letter to schools to reassure families that children can attend school with a mild cough or cold and that prolonged period of absence is likely to heighten a child’s anxiety about attending school in the future. The guidance can be found here: https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/is-my-child-too-ill-for-school/, and the letter can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/letter-to-school-leaders-on-mild-illness-and-school-attendance/letter-to-school-leaders-on-mild-illness-and-school-attendance.

The campaign is not aimed at parents of children who face greater barriers to attendance, such as pupils with long term medical conditions. Campaign materials shared with schools and local authorities reminded them that strategies to increase attendance should take a ‘support first’ approach in all instances. The department’s ‘Working together to improve school attendance’ guidance expects schools to have sensitive conversations with children and families and work with them to put support in place for their individual needs. This guidance is available here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/63049617e90e0729e63d3953/Working_together_to_improve_school_attendance.pdf. Schools must also follow the ‘Supporting pupils at school with medical conditions’ statutory guidance that outlines the support that pupils with medical conditions must receive at school so they have full access to education and it is available here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5ce6a72e40f0b620a103bd53/supporting-pupils-at-school-with-medical-conditions.pdf.