§ 11. Mr. Jim Cunningham (Coventry, South)What assistance he proposes for schools and local authorities to combat truancy. [116795]
§ The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. Charles Clarke)Truancy is a major contributor to youth offending and can have a devastating impact on a child's prospects for later life. That is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment has allocated extra resources through the social inclusion pupil support grant programme, worth some £500 million over three years, to help reduce levels of unauthorised absence and exclusion.
Secondly, as part of the Criminal Justice and Court Services Bill, we are introducing an increase in the penalty on parents for failing to ensure that a child attends school regularly.
Thirdly, we are considering whether we can encourage the type of scheme that is active in York, for example, in which police, education welfare officers and social services officers work together as a team to pick up children who are truant on the streets and bring them back into education.
§ Mr. CunninghamI welcome my hon. Friend's statement. Will he tell me how much of the £500 million pupil support grant will be spent in Coventry and the west midlands, and what schemes he has in mind?
§ Mr. ClarkeI cannot tell my hon. Friend the detailed breakdown, local education authority by local education authority. However, I can say that a wide range of different types of scheme is being introduced. The most important is to provide proper education places so that children who are otherwise being excluded or truanting can receive a proper education, sometimes in school, sometimes out of school. There have been some successful examples of that in the west midlands, I believe.
§ Mr. Owen Paterson(North Shropshire): Who gains if parents of truants are sent to jail for three months?
§ Mr. ClarkeThe main thing is to ensure that parents take their responsibilities—[Interruption.] I will answer the question, but in my own way rather than in the way required by the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr. Paterson).
The purpose of the legislation is to ensure that parents live up to their responsibilities to make sure that their children go to school, as there is a massive correlation between people who do not attend school early in life and crime later in life. In fact, I believe it extremely unlikely that the courts will choose to imprison a parent, save in exceptional circumstances. Making the offence imprisonable gives the courts much greater flexibility in responding to the circumstances of individual cases.