Children missing education guidance must be strengthened, warns charity

The Department for Education’s draft statutory guidance on children missing education omits children with SEN or disabilities from its list of children at particular risk.

The guidance, which is currently out for consultation, highlights the vulnerability of gypsy, Roma and Traveller pupils, those in the armed forces, those supervised by the youth justice system, runaways, and pupils at risk of harm or neglect.

But children with SEN are only mentioned in the part of the draft guidance that refers to parents’ responsibilities. The guidance simply states that “children with statements of SEN can be home educated, but the relevant local authority must provide the special educational provision specified in the child’s statement.”

Jane McConnell, chief executive of Independent Parental Special Educational Advice, argued that the government guidance should highlight the fact that children with SEN are vulnerable to missing part of their education, particularly if they are in care.

“Children with SEN and disabilities are also at high risk of being out of school and missing education, not always through choice,” said McConnell. “It is essential that any new SEN system works for individual children and that it does not rely only on parents to drive and shape the system.

“Children in care with SEN or disabilities do not have an independent voice to challenge the local authority, which is their corporate parent and responsible for making educational provision.”

McConnell said the SEN code of practice should be added to the guidance before its publication.

“This would remind local authorities to join up their thinking and their responses when dealing with children missing education so that in appropriate cases, the children missing education officers might request SEN colleagues to do a statutory assessment under SEN legislation for a child who is out of school,” she said.

Local authorities in England have a legal duty to identify children missing education.

The DfE said it would announce the results of its consultation on statutory guidance relating to children missing education “in due course”.

“We believe that all children, regardless of their circumstances, are entitled to an excellent education which will help them shape their own futures,” said a DfE spokeswoman.

“This is why we require schools to keep accurate attendance records and inform the council where they have concerns about a child’s regular absence.