School truants hit record 63,000 a day

The rise came despite repeated Labour promises to cut absentee numbers.

Ministers admitted more must be done to tackle the problem.

But they tried to pin the blame on families taking holidays in term time when trips are cheaper.

Shadow children’s secretary Michael Gove blasted the Government’s “excuses and complacency”. He added: “There are now twice as many schooldays missed as the Government promised in 1997.

“Labour ministers have completely failed to get a grip of the problem. Yet again the latest figures have prompted more excuses and complacency.”

Liberal Democrat children’s spokesman David Laws joined the condemnation. He said: “The truancy rate has rocketed under Labour. Despite ministers throwing vast sums of money at the problem, millions more school- days are lost because of children bunking off.”

Unauthorised absence is at its highest level on record, yesterday’s figures showed, with pupils away for one per cent of all school sessions – up by a quarter from the previous year.

As Chancellor in 1998, Gordon Brown set a target of reducing truancy by a third from the figure then of 0.7 per cent. But levels are now twice as high as Labour promised.

Around £1billion has been spent on anti-truancy measures since 1997. Some 30,000 penalty notices have been issued to parents with 19,000 families signing “parenting contracts” promising to send their children to school. In several high-profile cases, parents have been jailed for not making sure their children go to school.

Children’s minister Kevin Brennan said the rise could be due to schools getting stricter on excuses.

Head teachers are now more likely to report family holidays taken during term time as unauthorised absences, he said.

Overall absence, including children off sick with permission, fell from 6.68 per cent to 6.49 per cent. Just under half of the absences were due to illness.

The second most commonly reported reason was family holidays.