School holiday fines: Parents hit by penalties rise 93%

In March 2019 we reported that the number of fines issued to parents in England for taking children on term time holidays had almost doubled in a year.

We took the number of fines issued for unauthorised holidays and divided this by the total number of pupils registered, multiplying that by 1,000 to get the number of fines per 1,000 pupils.

We concentrated on this rather than 'parental responsibility' penalties in general because holidays were by far the main reason for a penalty notice being issued.

Get the data

• Pupil absence in schools in England: 2017 to 2018

Quotes and interviews

• Jon Platt, a father who lost a Supreme Court battle against a fine
• Spokesman, Department for Education
• Chris McGovern, chairman, The Campaign for Real Education
• Jane Lynch, a parent from Margate
• Spokesperson, Isle of Wight Council
• Spokesman, The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT)

Visualisation

• Interactive map: Term time holiday fines - penalties issued per 1,000 pupils during 2017-18
• Bar chart: Penalty notices given to parents, 2013-14 to 2017-18
• Bar chart: The number of fines issued per thousand students in 2017-18, top 5 councils

Related repos

• Parents fined £24m for children's truancy and term time holidays - March 2018
• Term-time holidays: Where most children were absent - March 2017