The five teenage boys couldn't have picked a worse day to bunk off school and visit Blackburn town centre. What started as a bit of a joke, ends with a very public humiliation as they're escorted into the back of a police van, in full view of a busy shopping street, by members of Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council's truancy team.
On a sunny spring day in Blackburn, two truancy teams - each comprising an education welfare officer and police officer - are patrolling the town centre looking for children who aren't at school. They are aided by what could be the most obvious deterrent to truancy that's ever been invented - the police van, parked outside Marks & Spencer, which sports a giant Truancy Patrol sticker on its side.
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