Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has vowed to boost attendance in schools, as absence rates across the country remain far higher than before the pandemic.
In a speech at an east London school on Wednesday, Ms Phillipson said the Government was committed to resolving the “crisis” of poor attendance through a “shared national effort”.
Data from the Department for Education shows that, before Covid the absence rate across England’s schools was 4.7 per cent. This jumped to 7.6 per cent in 2021/22 and by 2022/23 had only come down slightly to 7.4 per cent.
The most recent public figures show that in the academic year 2024/25 to date, the absence rate has dropped a little further, to 6.7 per cent, but ministers argue progress must accelerate.
In her speech to teachers - who had gathered from across London at Mulberry Academy Shoreditch - the Education Secretary suggested that some schools were failing to show enough willingness to improve the situation.
“Our data shows that there are schools facing similar challenges, but with significantly different performance on attendance,” she said.
“Some [are] doing really well, others not quite making enough progress, not yet learning from the best, and I just can’t accept - I won’t accept - damage being done to students’ prospects.
“I expect schools falling behind on attendance to catch up, and fast, because we all know that children’s life chances are at stake.
“I know that’s what you want too, and many schools are already working incredibly hard to improve their attendance figures - because there’s nothing inevitable about the state that we’re in. Yes, we had a pandemic, but attendance was moving in the wrong direction even before that.”
The minister also stressed the importance of boosting children’s sense of belonging in order to drive down absence rates, warning: “A third of UK children do not feel they belong at school - the worst rate in the OECD.”
In London, the absence rate in the academic year so far - 6.2 per cent - is lower than any other English region, but the capital has also made the smallest amount of progress compared with other parts of the country, year-on-year.
Speaking with the Standard after her speech, Ms Phillipson said: “This is something that parents, schools and Government need to do as a collective national effort.
“We are providing schools with more tools around data that they can use, we’re supporting them to develop ‘whole school’ approaches to really double down on tackling the attendance crisis that we face.”
Asked about the fact that London has seen better levels of attendance than other regions, she said: “London is in a better starting position, but progress is slower than what we would like, and that’s why the work that we’re leading today with school leaders is so important.
“There are children who are regularly missing significant periods of time out of school, often for complex reasons, but alongside that, we know we can make a lot of progress if we take action as early as possible…
“The reason that attendance is so crucial is that we know that we can’t deliver high and rising standards in our schools if children are not there - children being in school is essential in order to deliver that brilliant education.”
