How you could be slapped with £2.5k fine and PRISON if your kids break school attendance rules – don’t do it
PARENTS could be slapped with a £2.5k fine and a prison sentence if their kids break school attendance rules.
Once your child is registered at a school, you must send them in every day and on time or you're breaking the law.
You are only allowed to keep your kids off school if they're too ill to go in.
Alternatively, you must write a letter to the school's headteacher in advance asking permission to keep your youngster off for a few days.
You can't keep kids out of school without this permission.
If you do, each parent can be fined £60 - which rises to £120 each if you do not pay within 21 days.
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Should you fail to pay the fee after 28 days, you could be fined £2.5k, slapped with a community order or sent to jail.
Earlier this year, a mum was grounded by a court after her child refused to go to school for four months.
Despite "dragging" the teen to the school gates and "chasing them through the streets", the parent was unable to get them to attend lessons.
Following a hearing, the mum was hit with a one-month community order - including a curfew stopping her from leaving her home from between 7pm and 6am for 30 days.
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She was also ordered to pay £234 in costs and a £95 victim surcharge.
And teachers at a secondary school in Newham, East London, revealed they make home visits every day a youngster is absent without a good reason.
They will even go in the school mini-bus — dubbed the Battle Bus — to call on kids with a note from parents if they are regularly off.
The hardline step has seen Cumberland Community School in Newham, East London, go from among the worst to the best in the country for GCSE results, with pupils often winning scholarships to top fee-paying schools such as Eton.