Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill

 Written evidence submitted by Jenny and Simon Cahill to The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill Committee (CWSB 63)

Submission of evidence for the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill from Jenny and Simon Cahill

1. We are a home educating mother and father of two. We have been home educating for five years and in that time have had the privilege to facilitate our children’s learning journeys, enabling them to flourish with a flexible, semi-structured approach. When our eldest first attended school, she was a vibrant child, who loved to learn. After the first term, she became quite unhappy and had lost her love of learning. Over the last five years, we have approached education on her terms and are pleased to say that she has made far more progress than she ever did at school and is much happier. Our second child joined us in our home education journey when he reached compulsory school age. He is making great progress by following his interests, in a way that would not be possible at school.

2. We would like to express our concerns about parts of the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill:

3. Page 2, lines 34-38 relating to Section 16E of the Children Act 2004: We have a moral concern that social workers responsible for checking on the welfare of Home Educated children should be trained to understand Home Education. Currently this is not the case. We would like to see social work guidance changed so that it is only a concern that a child is, "out of education" rather than simply, "out of school." The two are not synonymous and mean quite different things.

4. Pages 6 and 7 starting on line 25 relating to 16LA Duty to share information: We are concerned that our data could be susceptible to data breaches and inappropriate sharing.

5. Page 49, line 14 relating to 436C Content and maintenance of registers: We are concerned that due consideration has not been given to the amount of time and effort that will be required for Home Educators to provide this information and for the Local Authority to process it. The amount of time spent educating with each parent varies on a weekly basis. So too, does the number of other individuals and organisations that are involved in the education of our children. We would need to contact the Local Authority on a weekly basis in order to keep them sufficiently updated, which would reduce the amount of time we could spend on Home Education. It seems that the nature of Home Education has been somewhat misunderstood, as many Home Educating families follow a semi-structured, child led approach and as such, local authorities are going to find themselves inundated with updates. We feel this is a moral an ethical issue as the efficacy of our Home Education will suffer due to onerous administrative tasks.

6. Page 53, line 3 relating to 436E Provision of information to local authorities: education provider: It is a concern that the other organisations and individuals who provide education to Home Educated children will also have to provide details to the Local Authority. This will add greatly to their administrative burden and may well discourage and prevent them from offering their services to the Home Education community, thereby removing key resources that are currently at our disposal. Further to this, it is unclear as to extent of which organisations and individuals will need to be included, for example: the nurse that told us about veins and arteries when we were last at our local surgery; the dentist that gave us an explanation about tooth decay; the relatives from abroad who told us about their culture; the shopkeeper that taught us how to work out change. The list goes on.

7. Page 55, line 1 referring to 436G Support: There is no provision here for examinations for Home Educated children. For years, Home Educating parent have been asking the government for access to examinations. It would be of great benefit to the Home Education community if inclusion in examination centres in every Local Authority area for Home Educated children could be included in this bill.

8. Page 46, line 34 and Page 59, line 26 undermine the primacy of the parent. The education act 1996, section 7 states that it is the parent’s duty to ensure that their child of compulsory school age receives a suitable education, either by regular attendance at school or otherwise. It is not the right of any public body to decide what is best for the child, other than when a child is subject to social services’ supervision and care.

January 2025.