Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Written evidence submitted by Philippa Mitchell to The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill Committee (CWSB 54)

Submission to Scrutiny Committee regarding the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill.

Introduction:

I am a home educating parent of over 10 years and would like the Committee to consider my submission.

To start, I would like to ask that the Committee invite Education Otherwise to give Oral Evidence, as I believe they are the best organisation to represent home educators.

I have many concerns about the Bill and how it could affect my family and friends.

These concerns focus on

· the high burden the provisions within the Register will place on home educating families,

· the removal of parental rights as the primary decider as to best education for the child,

· the amount of power and data given to Local Authorities despite well documented breaches in existing data laws and abuse of existing power,

· the lack of and independent body to adjudicate between LAs and home educators,

· the limited support within the Bill for home educators;

· and the introduction of severe fines or even imprisoning parents who do not/cannot comply. I fail to understand how imprisoning a parent who is doing their best for their child is good for that child or the family.

· The lack of the child’s voice in this bill.

I am also very concerned about how this Bill proposes to penalise children, who may be suffering bullying, abuse, mental health issues etc in school, but have been reported to children’s services and so will not be able to home educate without LA permission or forced back into school; and how this will be abused by LAs/staff within LAs who are strongly against home education.

Submission

1. I have one child who went to school for 2 years and is now doing GCSEs before going to college. My second child has never been to school. Neither have additional needs.

2. I have been part of a group liaising with my Local Authority (LA) since 2018 to improve relationships between the LA and Home Educators. I believe that this Bill will make the relationship between the LA and families worse with its focus on intrusion into family life, the increase in penalties and threats and the lack of any real support for families from the LA.

3. The LA will struggle to maintain the database without further funding, resulting in even less time for them to support families who need their help. This will make it more likely for children who really need intervention to fall through the cracks.

4. I believe that, used correctly, the existing laws and guidance enable LAs to assess educational provision and progress in home education and ensure that home educated children are properly safeguarded. So these aspects of the Bill are unnecessary.

5. I think that the Registration Duties for parents (436 C and D) create a huge, unnecessary and unrealistic burden on parents. And it gives far too much power to the LA to intrude on private home life, including asking for any information they like (463C (3)). Home education is intrinsically intertwined with our family life and 463C (3) is The level of reporting about educational provision indicates the lack of understanding of home education and must contravene GDPR. It will reduce the likelihood of family and friends supporting the education of the child if they do not want their details to be reported to and stored by the LA. It will reduce the likelihood of groups of home educators coming together to educate their children together, as again private details will need to be shared with the LA. IT will reduce the likelihood of tutors and educational providers wanting to work with home educators as their private details will be shared. Especially as there is no information within the Bill as to what will be done with this information and why the LA requires it.

6. The requirement of reporting changes in educational provision within 15 days is very unrealistic as many of us change or add new aspects (one off or regular) to our provision many times over the year. This creates a huge burden for home educators and the LA.

7. There is no indication what the ‘prescribed time’ will be before people providing education will have to report to the LA with details of their students. They can also be asked by the LA to verify that X child has been educated by them. And in addition, potentially fined if the LA decides the information provided is inaccurate. Whilst I appreciate this is trying to find illegal schools, it is a massive hammer to crack this nut and will result in a massive burden on all Educational Providers and make them less likely to want to work with home educated children.

8. The above points will seriously impact the education of children at home and result in these children and their families finding harder to find suitable educational provision, especially working towards exams, specialised subjects or vocational skills. This will penalise these children and does nothing to improve wellbeing or education.

9. As many families have moved to home education after finding the State has either not provided, or would not provide (in my case) their children with a Suitable, Full Time and Efficient Education according to Age, Aptitude and Ability (as per the Law), this is a very serious impact on the future our children’s education.

10. I also have serious concerns about the safety of many people’s private details and information be kept by the LA, especially given data breaches, the regular turnover of staff and what this information will be used for.

11. The idea that the LA is the final arbiter of whether home education is suitable for a child is incredibly worrying. The majority of LA staff working in Home Education have little knowledge of the wide variety of additional needs (including complex needs) that can be found in home educated children and nor do they have knowledge of the range of educational styles that home educators use. So simply put, they are not able to assess in full the suitability of home education. In addition, in some Counties the LA is well known to dislike home education and staff have regularly overstepped the existing law and guidelines. This Bill gives them a carte-blanche to pretty much do what they like.

12. Related to point 7, is that the Bill removes the primacy of parents in deciding how and where their children should be educated. It does not even consider the voice of the child in these situations. Children could be forced back into a school with the provisions in the Bill as they are, even if the Child has real fears, concerns or mental health issues about being made to go back to school. Parents know their child better than any teacher, EHE Officer or social worker and they know what is best for their child.

13. Linked to this, is the incredibly worrying aspects in the sections referring to SAOs. Many people have been referred to children’s services maliciously (sometimes by an abusive family member) or through the ignorance of a neighbour. Now this referral could instigate an SAO and the LA could force their way into a child’s home. This is a huge invasion of privacy and family rights. Not even a child on a protection plan has to let Children’s Services in to their home.

14. Relating to 13, there is no independent body for home educators to turn to if they are in disagreement with the LA, especially regarding an SAO. At present, parents can go to Tribunal and many do, with the majority of Tribunals being overturned by the Judge and found in favour of the family – again, this illustrates the inability of LAs to identify what suitable education looks like.

15. In this Bill, 463P, the Home Educator can only push against a wrong decision by the LA by going to the Secretary of State. This is time consuming, costly and has very high for the family – including fines and imprisonment. So, many parents are likely to allow their children to be put into schools, even though they know that school is not the best place for their child and could result in severe damage to the child’s physical or mental health. This does not improve Education or Wellbeing.

16. Home Educators need a fully independent body, that is free or inexpensive to use, to enable them to challenge poor decisions by unqualified, inexpert and often biased local authority staff. In my LA, staff turnover is high – in the last 4 years we have had at least 3 major changes in EHE Officers, in 2020 with a full change and since then only 2 of the original replacements (out of 8) are the same. This exacerbates the issue the person making a decision may be doing it from other people’s reports and data and have little experience of the family or child themselves.

17. The suggested Support in 463 G is quite frankly pathetic. Advice is better obtained from other home educators. At the very least support should be improved, for example free/discounted access to Council run services (sports centres etc); proper access to the provisions on an EHCP (for example home educated children in Surrey cannot access Speech and Language Therapy as it is only done through schools and not health centres, even though it is a health issue for children not of CSA); ensuring that there are sufficient exam centres around each County; and financial support towards exams or other qualifications.

18. council is nearly broke and if Devolution goes through in the next year or 2 it will be billions of pounds in debt.

19. EHE staff are already stretched dealing with the current requirements of contacting home educators, asking for and reviewing annual reports and any follow-up required and supporting the families that need extra help. How are they going to do all of this on top? If the government is planning to use AI then they need to let people know as using our private family information for AI is not at all ethical to my mind.

January 2025.