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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
National
Richard Adams and Kiran Stacey

Labour vows to tackle school absences and ‘broken relationship’ with families

Bridget Phillipson looks at Keir Starmer (out of focus in the foreground) during a visit to a school
Bridget Phillipson said ‘a staggering number of children’ were persistently absent from school. Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA

Labour has vowed to reset the “broken relationship between schools and families” by tackling the crisis in pupil absences and child mental health, ahead of rival policy announcements from the party and the government this week.

Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, is to set out the “generational challenges” facing England’s schools and pupils in a keynote speech on Tuesday. It will come a day after the education secretary, Gillian Keegan, announces the government’s latest efforts to repair school attendance rates since the Covid pandemic.

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