Figures released by the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) showed that permanent exclusions fell in 2002-03 by almost a quarter to 9,290, leading junior education minister Ivan Lewis to say that classroom behaviour was improving.
But the figures have been disputed by community education groups, who say the number of young people being taken out of school is increasing and that the Government has created new methods of exclusion that avoid statistical measurement.
Gerry German, director of the Communities Empowerment Network, said: "We don't believe the situation is improving. The question is how many children and young people are outside mainstream education."
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