HC Deb 26 July 1977 vol 936 cc135-6W
43. Mr. Evelyn King

asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if she will issue advice to local authorities in the matter of married women in their seventeenth year attending school.

Miss Margaret Jackson

My right hon. Friend does not consider that there is a general need for advice in this subject. She has, however, made it clear that any authority which consulted the Department would be advised only to prosecute the parent of a married 16 year old—particularly of one who no longer lived at the parental home—after the most careful consideration had been given to the particular circumstances of the case, and especially to whether such a prosecution was really required by educational considerations.