Parents charged £12.5 million in school holiday term-time fines since rule change

As yet another school holiday term-time fine case is thrown out of court, loveMONEY research shows that, rather than deter parents taking their kids out of school for family holidays, the numbers have gone up as councils are cashing in.

More than 208,000 fines worth £12.5 million have been issued to parents in England for taking their kids on holiday during term-time since the Government tightened the rules in 2013, according to loveMONEY research.

School fines for term time trips have become a fiercely debated topic in the last few years.

The latest case to hit the headlines involves Andy and Lolita Kelly from Scunthorpe in North East Lincolnshire.

The couple, who work for British Steel on strict rotas, decided to pay the a £120 fine to take son, Scott, out of school for a five-day trip to Lanzarote in October 2015.

But in November the local authority (LA) said this was not enough and the family would face court which can issue a further fine of £2,500 each for poor attendance.

The case was thrown out after Magistrates ruled that Scott did have good attendance record.

In the past schools could grant parents leave for their children during term time of up to 10 days in 'special circumstances'.

But in September 2013 the Government changed the rules in England so that absence is only granted in ‘exceptional circumstances’ in order to improve attendance and stop parents from thinking they were entitled to the time.

Now, if you choose to take your child out of school for a family trip during term time it will likely go down as an ‘unauthorised absence’ and the council responsible for education in the area will issue a £60 fine to each parent for each child which, if not paid, rises to £120 and can lead to prosecution or more fines.

So we decided to take a look at how well the Government’s crackdown has worked in deterring parents from taking their children out of school for family trips and whether attendance has improved as a result.

Bag a free holiday (not in term-time) with these air mile credit cards

Surge in school fines

LoveMONEY contacted all 152 councils in England with a Freedom of Information request on April 13 and got responses from 130 – over 85% of the total.

We asked about the number of fines issued for unauthorised term time holiday before the rules changed in 2012/13 and for every year after.

Some weren’t able to separate out this data from the more general ‘unauthorised absences’ or could only do so for more recent years.

Of the 130 councils which responded 110 or 72% provided information for at least one academic year

Below is a summary of the information collected. The figures for 2015/16 are obviously incomplete, which is why they are much lower.

*Figures show fines issued so far in 2015/16 up to April 2016

As you can see the total number of fines for unauthorised family holiday during term time has surged since the rules were tightened.

In 2012/13, 22,987 were issued but in the last full academic year 2014/15 the total number being issued has jumped a whopping 292% to 90,062.

Overall there have been 208,324 fines handed out since the rules changed, which at £60 a time means parents have been ordered to pay at least £12.5 million in charges.

Money raised from the fines go towards paying for the administration of the penalty notice scheme and the cost of any further action needed.

The table below shows the councils that recorded the biggest number of fines for unauthorised term time holiday in the last full academic year 2014/15.

Lancashire County Council handed out the most fines for unauthorised term time holidays in 2014/15, up 377% compared to 2012/13. The 4,279 fines issued to parents for the academic year 2014/15 were worth at least £256,740.

Lancashire County Councillor Matthew Tomlinson, cabinet member for children, young people and schools, said: "As Lancashire has more schools than any other local authority we are always likely to issue the most fines. 

"The decision to authorise absence or not rests with the headteacher of the particular school and penalty notices are an enforcement option that are available to local authorities, if requested by schools. In line with stricter Government guidelines, headteachers are now only able to authorise absence in exceptional circumstances.  Although each request is taken on its merits, the starting point is always that term time is for education.

"We encourage schools to work closely with parents to reduce unauthorised absences.  Our aim throughout is not to punish parents but to ensure that children and young people attend school and receive a good education.

"Making sure that all young people receive a good education is my highest priority and the evidence shows that attainment is linked to attendance.  If children miss out on school they miss out on learning."

Bag a free holiday with these air mile credit cards

Have the fines helped improve attendance at schools?

Back in September 2013, the Government tightened the rules on the circumstances fines could be issued for taking children out of school during term-time to improve attendance and deter parents from thinking they had the right to 10 days of extra leave.

But the change has been wildly unpopular and many, after weighing up the relative cost of the penalty versus the saving of organising trips off-peak, are still clearly choosing to go ahead with holiday plans that mean taking their kids out of school.

However, the Government argues that the number of persistent absentees in England’s schools has dropped by over 40% and now 200,000 fewer pupils are missing school compared to 2010 thanks to the work of teachers who are insisting on improved attendance and enforcing the stricter rules.

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “Children should not be taken out of school without good reason. That is why we have tightened the rules and are supporting schools and local authorities to use their powers to tackle unauthorised absence.”

It also points out that overall absence rates were 6.5% in 2007 but have dropped to 4.6% in 2015 .

However, it is difficult to see how this can be the result of schools clamping down on holidays during term time, as figures show they are going up each year.

Unauthorised family holidays accounted for 4.4% of all absences in 2012/13, 5.9% of all absences in 2013/14 and 5.9% of all absences in 2014/15 according to Government statistics from the Pupil Absence in Schools in England national reports for state-funded primary, secondary and special schools.

Criminalising parents

The problem – apart from the huge amount of fines being issued – is that parents are at risk of prosecution for failing to pay them within 21 days.

In our FOI request, we also asked about the number of parents that have been taken to court under Section 444 of the Education Act.

This act is used to take parents for a range of reasons including general unauthorised absences as well as unauthorised absence due to term time holiday.

Of the 152 councils 127 – or 84% – responded with figures for at least one of the years asked for.

In total, from 2013/14 to 2015/16 37,624 parents have been prosecuted under Section 444 of the Education Act.

The information is collated below:

**Figures show number of parent prosecutions so far in 2015/16 up to April 2016

Again since the change to the rules to term time holidays came in the total number of parents getting prosecuted under the Education Act has surged. While the councils aren't able to separate the figures we can assume that tightening rules on term time holiday played a large part in this.

In the academic year 2012/13 9,000 parents were prosecuted but this has jumped 68% to 15,120 in 2014/15 following the introduction of tougher rules.

Below are the councils which have taken the most parents to court in the last full academic year 2014/15.

As you can see Manchester City Council took the most parents to court under the Education Act Section 444 in 2014/15 up 34% compared to 2012/13 before the rules were introduced.

A spokesperson for Manchester City Council, said:

"All parents have a legal obligation to ensure their child is in school every day they should be.

"Schools work very hard with pupils and parents to ensure this happens, but where parents repeatedly fail to send their child to school, and refuse to work with schools to address any underlying issues, then legal action is sometimes the only route left to schools to try to get pupils back into the classroom."

What’s next for school fines?

With no apparent downward impact on the number of holidays taken during term time, the it's hard to argue that the Government's stricter rules around fines are the reason overall absence figures have fallen.

Instead, the number of fines have soared and parents are increasingly being criminalised. However, there is no signs the Government will budge on its policy.

The Government says it wants to be clear that school attendance is non-negotiable and the DfE is supporting the Isle of Wight Council in trying to appeal a recent High Court verdict in support of Jon Platt in the Supreme Court.

Jon Platt, a dad from the Isle of Wight, was taken to court under the Education Act in October last year after refusing to pay the fine citing it was the only time he could get his whole family together.

Platt won his case after he argued the wording of Subsection 1 of Section 444 of the Education Act 1996 required parents to ensure their children attended school regularly, which he did.

Isle of Wight Council wanted to seek clarification so appealed against the decision at the High Court in London, which in May agreed with the original verdict.

The case is thought to have set a precedent for other parents that want to challenge the rules.

Read: High Court ruling: parents can challenge fines for taking kids on holiday during term-time.

The case has had a knock on impact on how councils are treating the fines.

A BBC investigation found six councils including Bury, Cornwall, Derby, Dorset, Oldham and Southwark have stopped issuing penalty notices, while a further 10 others had dropped cases against parents and another 11 were reviewing their policy.

While Mr Platt's case is well known, other parents are stepping up to keep pressuring the Government to rethink the penalties.

Father-of-two David Hedley is the latest to speak out about the charges. He and his wife were fined for taking their daughters out of school for a holiday, even though it was the only time they had between her cancer treatments. Even though the fine was dropped Hedley has launched a parliamentary e-petition calling for the penalties to be scrapped, which has gained nearly 200,000 signatures – double the number needed to trigger a debate in Parliament.

His petition reads: “Myself and my wife received a fine for our two eldest children (two fines each parent) for taking our children on holiday for five days in term time which was the only week free from surgery and radiotherapy (school knew of cancer diagnosis). This apparently is not an exceptional circumstance.”

But after being debated in Parliament on July 11 the Government issued a response which said: “Every extra day of school missed can affect a pupil’s chance of gaining good GCSEs. The government is committed to reducing all school absence unless there are unavoidable reasons.”

So it seems the Government is resolute in keeping this hated fine in force for now, but with more and more parents fighting back this issue won't disappear. Instead other solutions like staggering term dates should be considered.

Bag a free holiday (not in term-time) with these air mile credit cards

Read these next:

School holiday fines: what you will pay for taking your child out of school during term time

Child Tax Credit: am I eligible, how to claim and how to renew

Avoid these hefty fines when travelling in Paris, Amsterdam and other European cities