A "huge" number of children have been missing school on Friday - because their parents are at home. The Children's Commissioner for England says the trend has been seen since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
Dame Rachel de Souza told the Commons Education Select Committee levels of persistent absence - where children miss 10% or more of school time - has been high since the Covid-19 pandemic. She cited figures which estimate that 818,000 of the 1.6 million children who were persistently absent across the autumn and spring terms in 2021/22 were off school for reasons other than illness.
Dame Rachel said she is “seriously worried” about the number of children who are persistently absent, adding that it is “one of the issues of our age”. She told MPs that discussions with families have exposed a number of reasons why the pandemic is still having a negative impact on attendance.
