As the long school summer break approached its mid-point recently, Margate beach was crowded with families enjoying the brief reprieve between the year’s fourth and fifth heatwaves. For most, thoughts of the classroom were probably not at the forefront of their minds.
But for the seven mothers and two fathers who were summoned at ۱۰am to a stuffy room in the town’s magistrates court, set just behind the beachfront strip of arcades, the subject was unavoidable. They were among hundreds of parents due in courts across England this month for failing to ensure their children had regularly attended school over the course of the last academic year.
They faced fines, or in extreme cases the theoretical possibility of three months in prison, depending on the reasons provided for the absences.
The first defendant to be called in admitted that he had traveled abroad with his partner and daughter for ۱۰ days at the start of the summer term. Taking her out of school to go on holiday for the third time in three consecutive years had pushed her annual attendance rate below ۷۵%.
But the family had needed a break, he told the court, because two close friends had recently died, and the child’s mother had been unwell. The timing of the trip – immediately after rather than during the Easter holidays – was, he said, prompted by the strain the family had been under, rather than because travel was cheaper during term time.
“There’s a lot going on at home,” he told the court, in weary explanation.
The three magistrates presiding over court two represented the sharp end of an ongoing drive to try to improve school attendance rates in England, which have never fully recovered after the closure of schools during Covid. Parents can be taken to court as a last resort if gentler attempts by the local authority to help them improve persistently poor attendance have failed, or if they have received multiple penalty notices for their child’s non-attendance within three years.
It is a drive that is faltering. In the same week in London, the Department for Education released data showing the overall absence rate for the academic year ۲۰۲۵-۲۶ for pupils in England was running at ۶.۹۳%, a slight rise on the previous year, and still significantly above the ۲۰۱۸-۱۹ pre-Covid levels when the national overall absence rate in England was just ۴.۷%. Persistent absence rates have doubled since the pandemic, with nearly one in five children now missing at least ۱۰% of school.
In Margate, the magistrates listened as a representative for Kent county council told the court that a girl’s parents had been fined a year earlier, for taking her with them while they made a time-term trip abroad for dental treatment, and also the year before that when they had taken an unauthorised holiday during school time.
“Unfortunately the availability of cheap travel is not a defence,” the local authority official said.
The father countered that his daughter had done some work on his iPad while they were away and showed no sign of having fallen behind; he was annoyed, he added, that staff from the primary school appeared to be monitoring his social media posts to track his movements, which he felt was a breach of his privacy. After some discussion with the magistrates, he accepted he was guilty, and was issued with a £۱۶۶ fine.
“You have a duty to send your daughter to school, and the council has a duty to prosecute you if you don’t,” the lead magistrate told him, warning that the fine needed to be paid at a rate of £۲۰ a month, to avoid bailiffs being sent to his home.
A record ۴۹۲,۸۲۵ penalty notices for unauthorised absences were issued to parents in England in ۲۰۲۴-۲۵ (the most recent year for which records are available), a slight increase on the year before and a sharp rise from the pre-Covid level of ۳۳۳,۳۸۸ penalties in ۲۰۱۸-۱۹. Researchers have previously warned of a “seismic shift” in attitudes to attendance since the pandemic, with concern that some parents no longer automatically subscribe to the view that children must be in school full-time.
The new education minister Paul Waugh acknowledged that progress on pulling attendance back to pre-pandemic levels had slowed, noting that data showed that absences due to illness were now ۲۵% higher on Fridays than the rest of week. “It’s possible that where pupils are less engaged with school overall, Friday is becoming a particular weak spot for attendance,” he wrote in response to the new figures.
The next parent in the Margate court was charged with the more serious offence – section ۴۴۴(۱A) of the Education Act ۱۹۹۶ – of “knowingly” allowing her child to miss school without a valid reason, a charge that can attract a fine of £۲,۵۰۰ or up to three months in prison, although custodial sentences are rarely handed down. This case was not a matter of a slightly lax approach to attendance on Fridays, but involved a ۱۴-year-old boy whose annual attendance rate was just ۱۹%.
A duty solicitor requested some time to talk to the mother, who appeared exhausted as the representative for the county council set out the charges against her. The case was subsequently adjourned because the solicitor needed time to collate evidence that her son had been seriously bullied at the school and was frightened of being attacked.
“I’m keeping him home. It’s a sad world where you need to keep a child home for their safety,” the mother said after the hearing, adding that her son had been diagnosed with ADHD and autism and that problems had begun when he switched to secondary school, when mild bullying from his peers progressed to violent abuse. The police had been called on several occasions. “My son’s had his ribs broken by bullies. He was threatened with a Stanley blade.”
She had been alarmed at being summoned to court. “I didn’t sleep last night,” she said, adding that she felt she had been doing her best in challenging circumstances, trying to teach her son at home, showing him how to bake, telling him about castles and how to manage money, although her capacity to teach a full curriculum was hampered by her own dyslexia. “I’m concerned he is becoming lonely. He struggles with friends, with going out.”
She has had extensive support from Kent’s children’s services team and in September her son is due to start a specialist college for children who display complex barriers to education; he would like in time to become a mechanic, and she was hopeful that the switch to the new school could still make that a realisable goal. A new court date was set for the autumn.
By late morning, the non-attendance hearings paused briefly because the seven remaining summonsed parents had not turned up to court. Staff seemed unsurprised that parents who struggled to get their children to school found it challenging to attend court on time, and decided to hear their cases in absentia.
While a couple of the Margate cases involved chronic, unexplained failures to get children to school, most concerned term-time holidays. More than ۹۰% of fines nationally (۴۵۹,۲۸۸ penalties in ۲۰۲۴۵-۲۵) are issued for this reason. One mother, charged with taking her seven-year-old daughter out of school for a third unauthorised holiday in three years, had emailed to say that she was unable to attend court, but wanted the magistrates to know that she was not planning to repeat the offence. She had chosen to break the law because she would not otherwise have been able to afford to go away. She was issued with a £۱۴۰ fine, and ordered to pay £۲۵۲ (once surcharge and court costs were added) at a rate of £۲۰ reduction a month from benefits.
Waugh noted that in addition to unauthorised holidays there were a range of reasons behind the absences – from the effect of screens on sleep, bullying associated with social media use, a rising number of children with special educational needs, the summer’s heatwaves, winter flu.
Prosecutions remain controversial, with campaigners arguing that penalties are usually issued against mothers, and that fines have an impact on already-tight family budgets. But the Department for Education is committed to using them as a final resort, pointing out that secondary school pupils who are persistently absent are three times more likely to join the rising numbers of young people who are not in education, employment or training (Neet).
A spokesperson for Kent county council said staff were working on understanding the triggers for school avoidance and had improved attendance in Kent schools to bring it “broadly in line with the national average”, adding that taking parents to court was “not a decision that is taken lightly and only where all other routes have failed”.
