The effectiveness of truancy sweeps has been called into question byresearch conducted by Action on Rights for Children. The researchexamined truancy sweeps conducted in 120 English and Welsh localauthority areas in autumn 2004.
Researchers found that, on average, a truancy sweep stopped fourchildren every hour. Of the four stopped, on average two and a half hadvalid reasons for being out of school and the remaining one and a halfwere truants.
Around a third of the local education authorities questioned closelyfitted the average. There were a few exceptions including nineauthorities that found truants in less than 30 minutes and four thatfound none whatsoever despite spending 22.5 police hours on thesweep.
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