Warning over ‘grossly inadequate’ mental health support for schools that could make high absence levels ‘the new norm’
Mental health support for children struggling to attend school is “grossly inadequate”, a report by a committee of cross-party MPs has said.
The number of children absent from school has more than doubled since the pandemic and a report by the Education Select Committee says ministers are not acting fast enough to get numbers down.
A “major cross-government review on how to overcome this challenge” is needed, the committee chair has said.
The children are asked to write about how they are feeling
One senior teacher has told Sky News she fears high levels of absence could become the “new norm” – inflicting long-term damage on thousands of children.
The latest figures show that in 2021/2022 more than 1.7 million children were persistently absent, meaning they missed 10% or more of school.
Around 125,000 spent more time out of class than in, according to Department for Education figures.
Furness Academy
The report is critical of the government’s approach, saying there has been “no significant improvement in the speed and scale” of reducing absence rates.
One of the authors’ biggest concerns is the rising rates of children struggling with their mental health.
Education Committee chair Robin Walker MP told Sky News: “It’s clear that since the pandemic there have been a growing number of children citing mental health reasons for being out of school.
“This is deeply troubling and it is evident that our health service can’t meet this growing demand, leaving schools to fill the gaps.
“A major cross-government review of how to overcome this challenge is needed and greater resources both inside and outside schools will be required.”
‘I just felt useless’
In Cumbria, teaching staff at Furness Academy in Barrow-in-Furness have been trying to reduce their absence rates by holding specialist mental health sessions with children struggling with school.
Sky News was given access to one of the sessions as students spoke openly about these struggles.
Josh, 13, said: “I felt like I was just one of the non-smart kids in school. I just felt useless.”
Josh said he ‘felt useless’
Teddy is six years old and staying in a homeless hostel
And another 13-year-old, Brooke, who has struggled with attendance, said: “I missed out a lot on the lessons. So I fell behind. I would just refuse to come in. I’d feel sick with anxiety in the morning before coming to school.”
John, also 13, said the sessions “have helped me improve my confidence. Maybe in the future I’ll be able to speak more instead of trying to hide myself away.”
The pilot scheme, funded by the government and run in conjunction with Westmorland and Furness Council, Furness Academy and the charity Family Action, has improved attendance for all of the children. But sessions like these are rare.
Diane McSharry, education officer at Westmorland and Furness Council, said the authority was under “huge pressure” to tackle low attendance.
“We have to come up with ways to support children and families to get over whatever the barrier is. It’s a constant battle but you have to think outside the box,” she said.
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Funding for schemes like this is often ad hoc and inconsistent, assistant head teacher Linzi Stanway said, and she doesn’t think Whitehall fully grasps the challenges they and others face.
“I think one of the things that’s missing at the moment is an understanding of just how difficult a process this is.
“I’m really worried that this is going to go on for a long period of time.
“And if we don’t do something quickly, I think it is going to become the new norm and that’s not going to be good for anybody.”
Furness Academy, staff have been trying to reduce their absence rates
Student Brooke speaks at a session
ANALYSIS: How Sky News has reported the national crisis of children missing from school
The Education Select Committee report has made a series of recommendations it says will help solve the national crisis in low attendance. Many of these issues have been highlighted by Sky News as part of a long-running investigation.
TEDDY’S STORY
Teddy is six years old and staying in a homeless hostel
The report says the rising costs of transport and uniforms was a major barrier to attendance, particularly affecting pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds.
Last May, Sky News featured the story of Sammy and her six-year-old son Teddy, who were living in a homeless hostel after their landlord evicted them through no fault of their own.
Sammy told Sky News she could not afford transport costs to get her son to school and he was slipping behind on his education.
The report said that while low-income families can apply for extra support for costs like transport, anecdotal evidence suggests take-up is low.
You can read Teddy’s story here.
CHARLIE’S STORY
Charlie is a passionate boxer
The committee heavily focuses on mental health as a barrier to attendance.
In June we reported on 13-year-old Charlie, who hasn’t been to school for the past three years. His dad James said his son was struggling with anxiety and that even though authorities had fined him thousands of pounds, he was “willing to go to prison” rather than force his son to school.
Today’s report said there is a “lack of consistency between England’s local authorities in their approach to issuing fines. Schools Minister Nick Gibb recently told the committee fines can be suitable, “if families are not prepared to engage” with support.
You can read Charlie’s story here
GEORGE’S STORY
George has not been to school for six months
The select committee also raises the problems faced by children with special educational needs (SEND). Absence rates are significantly higher among pupils with SEND and there’s a shortage of special school places in many parts of the country
In July, Sky News spoke to 10-year-old George and his mum Rachel.
He has a complex speech disorder that makes it hard for him to learn, and he has been waiting years for a diagnosis to see if he has autism.
We revealed how thousands of children with special educational needs or disabilities are missing out on the education they are entitled to because of huge delays in the system designed to support them.
A record half a million pupils now have an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) – a legal document setting out a child or young person’s special educational needs, the support they require, and the outcomes they would like to achieve.
The plans must be issued within 20 weeks of being applied for, but analysis of government data by Sky News reveals this deadline is missed in a staggering half of all cases, meaning thousands of children are having to wait. In an exclusive interview with Sky News, Education Secretary Gillian Keegan was forced to admit that children like George “won’t be helped as much as we want to, as quickly as we want to”.
You can read George’s story here
THE MISSING CHILDREN
The report urges the government to bring into law a national register of children missing education.
We reported how thousands of children vanished from school and authorities often had no idea where they were.
On a single day in spring this year, local authorities in England reported an estimated 24,700 children as missing education – a worrying snapshot of the crisis facing schools.
A Sky News FOI revealed that Education Welfare Officers have been cut by half in the last decade.
The report recommends that the Department for Education urgently looks at the funding available for these jobs.
You can read the story here
Prosecutors are considering whether to bring further criminal charges against Lucy Letby over the deaths of babies at two hospitals where she worked
The Crown Prosecution Service said it had received “a full file of evidence from Cheshire Constabulary asking us to consider further allegations in relation to deaths and non-fatal collapses of babies at the Countess of Chester Hospital and Liverpool Women’s Hospital”.
“We will now carefully consider the evidence to determine whether any further criminal charges should be brought,” it added.
“As always, we will make that decision independently, based on the evidence and in line with our legal test.”
Letby, 35, was found guilty of murdering seven children and attempting to murder seven more between June 2015 and June 2016 while working in the neonatal unit of the Countess of Chester Hospital and is currently serving 15 whole-life orders.
Letby worked at the Countess of Chester Hospital and Liverpool Women’s Hospital
She is understood to have carried out two work placements at Liverpool Women’s Hospital, where she trained as a student, between October and December 2012, and January and February 2015.
Police said in December that Letby was interviewed in prison as part of an investigation into more baby deaths and non-fatal collapses.
A Cheshire Constabulary spokesperson said: “We can confirm that Cheshire Constabulary has submitted a full file of evidence to the CPS for charging advice regarding the ongoing investigation into deaths and non-fatal collapses of babies at the neo-natal units of both the Countess of Chester Hospital and the Liverpool Women’s Hospital as part of Operation Hummingbird.”
Detectives previously said the investigation was looking into the full period of time that Letby worked as a nurse, covering the period from 2012 to 2016 and including a review of 4,000 admissions of babies.
Letby’s lawyer Mark McDonald said: “The evidence of the innocence of Lucy Letby is overwhelming,” adding: “We will cross every bridge when we get to it but if Lucy is charged I know we have a whole army of internationally renowned medical experts who will totally undermine the prosecution’s unfounded allegations.”
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Three managers at the hospital where Lucy Letby worked have been arrested on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter.
On Tuesday, it was confirmed that three managers at the Countess of Chester hospital had been arrested on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter in a separate investigation.
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Police said the suspects, who occupied senior positions at the hospital between 2015 and 2016, have all been bailed pending further inquiries.
There is also an investigation into corporate manslaughter at the hospital, which began in October 2023.
A public inquiry has also been examining the hospital’s response to concerns raised about Letby before her arrest.
In May, it was announced the inquiry’s final report into how the former nurse was able to commit her crimes will now be published early next year.
Earlier this year, Letby’s lawyers called for the suspension of the inquiry, claiming there was “overwhelming and compelling evidence” that her convictions were unsafe.
In February, an international panel of neonatologists and paediatric specialists told reporters that poor medical care and natural causes were the reasons for the collapses and deaths.
Their evidence has been passed to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), which investigates potential miscarriages of justice, and Letby’s legal team hopes her case will be referred back to the Court of Appeal.
A power outage that shut Heathrow Airport earlier this year, causing travel chaos for more than 270,000 passengers, was caused by a “catastrophic failure” of equipment in a nearby substation, according to a new report.
Experts say the fire at the North Hyde Substation, which supplies electricity to Heathrow, started following the failure of a high-voltage electrical insulator known as a bushing, before spreading.
The failure was “most likely” caused by moisture entering the equipment, according to the report.
Two chances were also missed that could have prevented the failure, experts found, the first in 2018 when a higher-than-expected level of moisture was found in oil samples.
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Moment Heathrow substation ignites
Such a reading meant “an imminent fault and that the bushing should be replaced”, according to guidance by the National Grid Electricity Transmission.
However, the report by National Energy System Operator (NESO) said the appropriate responses to such a serious issue were “not actioned”, including in 2022 when basic maintenance was postponed.
“The issue therefore went unaddressed,” the report added.
The design and configuration of the airport’s internal power network meant the loss of just one of its three supply points would “result in the loss of power to operationally critical systems, leading to a suspension of operations for a significant period”, the report added.
Heathrow – which is Europe’s biggest airport – closed for around 16 hours on 21 March following the fire, before reopening at about 6pm.
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Heathrow bosses were ‘warned about substation’
Around 1,300 flights were cancelled and more than 270,000 air passenger journeys were disrupted.
Tens of millions of pounds were lost, thousands of passengers were stranded, and questions were raised about the resilience of the UK’s infrastructure.
More than 71,000 domestic and commercial customers lost power as a result of the fire and the resulting power outage, the report said.
NEOS chief executive, Fintan Slye, said there “wasn’t the control within their [National Grid’s] asset management systems that identified that this [elevated moisture levels] got missed.
“They identified a fault, [but] for some reason the transformer didn’t immediately get pulled out of service and get repaired.
“There was no control within the system that looked back and said ‘oh, hang on a second, you forgot to do this thing over here’.”
Sky’s science and technology editor, Tom Clarke, pointed to the age of the substation’s equipment, saying “some of these things are getting really very old now, coming to the end of their natural lives, and this is an illustration of what can happen if they are not really well maintained”.
The report also highlights a lack of joined-up thinking, he said, as “grid operators don’t know who’s critical national infrastructure on the network, and they don’t have priority”.
Responding to the report’s findings, a Heathrow spokesperson said: “A combination of outdated regulation, inadequate safety mechanisms, and National Grid’s failure to maintain its infrastructure led to this catastrophic power outage.
“We expect National Grid to be carefully considering what steps they can take to ensure this isn’t repeated.
“Our own Review, led by former Cabinet Minister Ruth Kelly, identified key areas for improvement and work is already underway to implement all 28 recommendations.”
In May, Ms Kelly’s investigation revealed that the airport’s chief executive couldn’t be contacted as the crisis unfolded because his phone was on silent.
Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, who commissioned the NESO report, called it “deeply concerning”, because “known risks were not addressed by the National Grid Electricity Transmission”.
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Mr Miliband said energy regulator Ofgem, which opened an investigation on Wednesday after the report was published, is investigating “possible licence breaches relating to the development and maintenance of its electricity system at North Hyde.
“There are wider lessons to be learned from this incident. My department, working across government, will urgently consider the findings and recommendations set out by NESO and publish a response to the report in due course.”
The Metropolitan Police previously confirmed on 25 March that officers had “found no evidence to suggest that the incident was suspicious in nature”.
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