British parents face PRISON for taking kids out of school for one-week family vacation

news.yahoo.com...

Here is another case where common sense has gone AWOL.

Now, in 2014, a local government in the West Midlands is preparing to send parents Stewart and Natasha Sutherland to jail because the couple took their three kids on a weeklong vacation near the beginning of the school year.

Apperantly new laws were introduced where you cannot take your kids out of school during term.

They booked their vacation in Oct. 2012. The draconian guidelines became effective on Sept. 1, 2013.

They booked the vacation a year before the new laws came into play. Cancelling this trip could cost them money they wouldn't get back.

As a consequence, school officials fined the couple £360 (just under $600). When the parents refused to pay after 21 days, the fine doubled. Since then, the penalties have increased to £2,000 (almost $3,300). The Sutherlands now also face the prospect of a three-month prison sentence.

Because of the parents employment this was the only time they could schedule their vacation.

This is crazy. My head is hurting trying to understand this. These parents are facing a 3 month jail sentence for taking their kids on a family holiday. To the Greek Isle of Rhodes, no less. Nothing educational there.

This quote makes my stomach queasy.

Sutherland has also claimed that a school official advised him that he and his wife had deprived their children “of six days education and should feel guilty.”

Sheer lunacy.

this is such a beatup though. they arn't going to (possibly) go to prision for the act of taking the kids out of school, they will go for refusing to pay the fine and letting it double and keep going until they face a jail sentence for continual refusal to pay.

either way its a ridiculous notion that they should be fined anyway. 6 measly days? jesus, i went to school for less then half the year most years and still blitzed everything, not saying every kid is the same but surely 6 days (at the start of the year no less, when they are basically learning NOTHING at all) is a joke to be fined over. i can understand perhaps a month? but 6 days? such draconian laws.

if this happened to me i would be taking my kid out of school and homeschooling.

reply to post by UFO1414


It is absurd. There is a similar attitude accelerating in the U.S., and the school can certainly turn you into CPS for pulling your kids out if they don't like your reasons, or they just don't like you. They are really clamping down on children and indoctrinating them into accepting tighter and tighter control.

Those kids probably learned more on vacation in Greece than they would have those six days in the classroom anyway.

reply to post by rayuki


True but the whole scope of getting fined for your kids missing school is ludicrous. $600? No thanks.

Should have just called them in sick for the week.

rayuki
this is such a beatup though. they arn't going to (possibly) go to prision for the act of taking the kids out of school, they will go for refusing to pay the fine and letting it double and keep going until they face a jail sentence for continual refusal to pay.

They won't go to prison period.

This would have to go through a court and when the judge understands that the holiday was booked before the rules were even known about they will be vindicated.

I personally don't agree you should take your kids out of school to go on holiday... but having said that I think the fine of £150 per parent is utter lunacy, and clearly a money making scheme.

We pay for our children's education through our taxes... how can they justify additional financial taxation on taking your kids out of school for a holiday?

It's also worth mentioning that all the flight prices are doubled and in some cases tripled within school holidays so, is this a way to bolster the economy by forcing parents to go on holiday during peak times?

Peace,

Korg.

reply to post by UFO1414


You can be sure that the parents were using their kids as drug mules, 'vacation' holiday is just the cover story. Big crime in the Greek Isles and the average british family is skint, thank to the messy work of government administration.

Tindalos2013
reply to post by UFO1414

 

You can be sure that the parents were using their kids as drug mules, 'vacation' holiday is just the cover story. Big crime in the Greek Isles and the average british family is skint, thank to the messy work of government administration.

I hope that was a joke...

Actually our economic recovery is more than well underway and will propel us to the front of the economic race within Europe...

British economy will be largest in Europe by 2030: Austerity will see UK surging ahead of Germany and France

Britain will leapfrog Germany to become Europe’s largest economy by 2030, economists predict.

Thanks to our decision not to join the euro, we will overtake France in less than five years to become the fifth-largest economy in the world.

In a significant boost to George Osborne’s austerity programme, the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) hailed the UK as the second-best performing economy in the Western world after the United States – and said France was one of the worst.

Peace,

Korg.

reply to post by UFO1414


This is awful of course, but I think it is worth mentioning a couple of things about the background as to why this law has come in at all.

Basically, there was a massive problem with truancy not to long back. Kids were playing truant, mothers and fathers were refusing to control their kids, and kids were missing basically entire years worth of education by the time it was their turn to take their GCSEs (that is the exam that kids generally take around age sixteen, which sets them up for college, which in turn sets them up for university, if that is an option. Its sort of a big deal, or at least it was).

This ridiculous ruling comes on the back of a part of a legal change which made it harder for parents to ignore or support truancy. Now, although I think that this ruling, and any that are like it, is utter bunkum, I also understand where it comes from historically. We had people in my year at school (back in the mists of a decade and a bit ago) who you would see for maybe six months out of the total months of a school year. Some of them were off traveling with their well to do parents, and had been exposed to all manner of educational stuff, and some had been running around the borough, dealing drugs, and keeping their parents from murdering one another.

The latter of those were the majority, unfortunately. This lead to chaos both inside and outside the school environment, and often allowed the child in question to have poor behavior reinforced by his or her circumstances, which would allow them to spread that behavior by violence to other students.

In an effort to prevent crap like that from ruining what was already a difficult educational environment for many, these new rules came into effect in some places. In my view they came in very very late indeed, and have been worded to bugger people up, rather than help children gain an education.

Some elements of these rules have improved certain aspects of student interaction with their school and local community, and others have merely constrained them, and limited their opportunities to gain real world experience. Its a hard line to walk, and given the governments propensity for failing to do even the simplest of things without making everyone miserable, it is no wonder that this particular set of rules causes as much hardship as it solves serious problems.

They are going to prison for not paying a fine not for taking their kids out of school

Truancy in UK schools has always been a problem so they introduced laws that fine repeat offenders the idea is that it makes parents more responsible for ensuring that their kids actually go to school and dont sit about playing xbox and smoking mums fags.

Like a lot of stuff reported in the daily mail, I think if you were involved directly with the case you would know that there is a lot more to it.

OtherSideOfTheCoin
They are going to prison for not paying a fine not for taking their kids out of school

Truancy in UK schools has always been a problem so they introduced laws that fine repeat offenders the idea is that it makes parents more responsible for ensuring that their kids actually go to school and dont sit about playing xbox and smoking mums fags.

Like a lot of stuff reported in the daily mail, I think if you were involved directly with the case you would know that there is a lot more to it.

Anyone whom is saying they are going to prison for not paying their fines are totally missing the point. The fine in this case was applied to an invalid situation.

This family booked their holidays a year before the law came into force and many months before it was even proposed. So... in this case the law would have financially hurt this family... had they not gone they would have lost money on the holiday... if they went they lost money in fines.

Because of this conflict, reason will prevail when it reaches court.

Korg.

I take my kids out whenever I want PERIOD! I am not their slave. They're my minions. Don't value the school system as it is, anyway. I don't give government or schools authority to fine me. They can expect me not to go into their houses and rape, murder, steal, but they may not steal my life, my income or my freedoms from me.

And guess what the travel agencies are getting wind of this too, the prices during school holidays are a lot higher than prices when the kids go back to school

Yet the teachers decide when they want to go on strike and have teacher training days during school terms

If I had kids I'd tip them BS and go on holiday when I like. Our UK justice system is a joke anyway I don't see any parents going to prison

Unity_99
I take my kids out whenever I want PERIOD! I am not their slave. They're my minions. Don't value the school system as it is, anyway. I don't give government or schools authority to fine me. They can expect me not to go into their houses and rape, murder, steal, but they may not steal my life, my income or my freedoms from me.

edit on 16-1-2014 by Unity_99 because: (no reason given)

Wake up!! We are all slaves to the system!

Korg.

I think the rules are pretty clear:

You have to get permission from the head teacher if you want to take your child out of school during term time.

You can only do this if:

you make an application to the head teacher in advance (as a parent the child normally lives with)
there are exceptional circumstances
It’s up to the head teacher how many days your child can be away from school if leave is granted.

It also says:

You must make sure your child gets a full-time education that meets their needs (eg if they have special educational needs). You can send your child to school or educate them yourself.

www.gov.uk...

So, either follow the rules of the public school system, or home school your children. These parents had a choice. They apparently decided to enroll their children in public school, but decided they didn't want to follow the rules of public school. Their fault.

On the conspiracy side.

IMO this is to do with the teaching fraternity themselves, They constantly grip about long (unpaid) hours doing supervision duties like sport and field trips (free meals and petrol allowance off course).

They have conveniently forgotten that the vast amount of their student fees where paid by the working classes and they choose there vocation eyes wide open. (a jolly).

What other institution has up to a minimum off 3 months (paid) vacation a year doing a 32 hour week with guaranteed weekends off.

Has local Govt over a barrel regarding finances/budgets, Using the students as a bargaining tool to improve their (own) lot.

But because they have pay top dollar (so to speak) for their vacation why not draft in a legislation to ensure no one else's family (plebs, yes they do think like that) can get budget deals (because we all have £40/£50k jobs).

The sooner they (teachers) realise that they owe the masses not the other way around the sooner we can develop a better teaching system.

Never has such a self centred spoilt lot needed a good boot up the proverbial backside.

lol... I've gotta laugh at the UK members trying to defend this nonsense with arguments like "it's to stop truancy". What a load of BS, if a kid wants to skip school they can do it without their parents ever knowing by simply pretending to go to school and then leave before the first classes start. There is no way the parents could know unless the school decides to ring every single parent of every child who doesn't turn up to school every day. But all of this is really beyond the point... a parent should have the right to take their children out of school for a week if they wish to go on a vacation and school time is the only time of year they can go. And how can "school officials" issue a fine anyway... I thought fines could only be issued by real police officers. I don't blame them for not paying.

I was going to ask if you're allowed to homeschool; that one was answered above.

The other thought is: if the child/ren is/are doing WELL in school, it should not be a problem - especially if they normally attend regularly. I think it should be on a case-by-case basis...

And what's to stop the head teacher from giving the family "lessons and homework" to be done while on holiday??

This is nonsensical for regular, responsible families; but I can understand it for underachieving, neglected kids who are just running wild. Then, of course, the question will be:

Who decides? Well, if the kids aren't up to grade level, and are falling short or behind while IN school, or have a certain number of unexcused absences (truant days) built up over their school careers - then, No. Sorry, you don't get to do that.

Somehow I don't think that was this family's situation!!!

We are right on the line of just how much interference in our lives do we actually want the Government, Local Authorities and our Institutions to be able to exert on our lives.

For me already its far too much.

This smacks of being a slyly well thought out means of imposiing new stealth taxes under supposedly honourable intentions, yet another underhand means of collecting extra revenue for the government - a stealth fine. Clearly the bankers have advised the government on this matter as the interest doubles and doubles which makes fines worthwhile etc. I bet its already been checked that these people have assets and are in a position to pay fines etc.

My scepticism here is simply because our worry should not be where parents take the odd week out of school it should be with the many kids we all see truanting in the streets and shops etc on a regular basis. Today where ever you look whether its services from your local authority, or business, suddenly a whole load of services now require extra charges being added to what originally were simple transactions for a set fee. A friend has just had to pay £97 for an extra copy of a document from her L A, must be the most expensive photocopy she will ever have to buy.

What I also don't like is the draconian fine aspect of this matter. Its yet a new way to not only impose petty beaurocracy and to frighten people but to punish also. The repercussions of this nonsense will reak havoc on the parent's CRB and credit ratings etc. How come a school is able to fine parents? Who says the fine, if not paid can be doubled. If they get away with this type of practise it will pop up wherever they can find a place to put this type of mechanism in to earn extra cash.

I admit I never took my kids out of school during term time for holidays, although we had the odd Friday and Monday off, which was squared with the teachers and never a bother. I just think this kind of thing should be negotiated, obviously if its abused then that is another matter.

Yet they frequently hit us with a strike day or a training day so the kids have to stay home.

Maybe we should remind them that they are depriving our children of an education.

CX.

Does anyone know where the revenue from these fines will be going?

Will the money be used to improve schools, or will local authorities use it to boost their budgets?

Schools close for teacher training days at least 5 days every year, why can't teachers train during the summer break instead of closing schools down?

What about when head-teachers close schools at a moments notice as soon as a snowflake appears in the sky?

Also, many schools take kids on ski-ing hols to France or somewhere and take them out of school for this, so will the schools also be fined?