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Answer - AHEd letter to A Johnson

Page history last edited by starkfamily1@... 17 years, 1 month ago

Here is the reply received by AHEd to our letter to Alan Johnson.

 

 

1st February 2007

 

Thank you for your email dated 15 January 2007, addressed to the Secretary of State for Education and Skills, about elective home education. I have been asked to respond as I deal with elective home education matters.

 

Firstly, I think it would be helpful to reassure you that the Government does not intend to withdraw the right of parents' to home educate their children if they so choose, nor to erode families' right to privacy, but wishes to ensure that all children aged 5-16 receive the suitable full-time education, to which they are entitled.

 

I should also re-iterate that the Department is proposing a consultation on elective home education, which may include suggesting changes to monitoring arrangements. Further work is still being done, and Ministers have not yet made any firm decisions on what might be included. Should the consultation proceed as anticipated, and if the

outcome were to suggest new duties on local authorities, requiring legislative changes, such changes would of course be subject to the full Parliamentary process. Only then could any changes to existing arrangements be introduced.

 

Any consultation will adhere to the Cabinet Office code of practice on consultations and the usual lines of Ministerial accountability will apply to this, as with all work undertaken by the Department for Education and Skills, including aappropriate

arrangements to ensure that marginalised groups are able to participate fully in the process. We are compiling a list of individuals and groups who have expressed interest in the consultation, the vast majority of whom would appear to be home

educating parents, as well as a number of home educating groups and some local authorities, all of whom might expect to be affected by any change to the status quo. I can confirm that you, as secretary of AHEd, are on the list.

 

The previous consultation on local authority guidelines was primarily targeted at local authorities as the end-users, but also included the larger home education support groups who were known to us at that time. The intention of the guidelines was to provide clarity and promote good practice. We are currently redrafting the

guidelines, which are due to be issued later this year.

 

I would urge you to gather your and your members' thoughts and respond to the consultation in due course so that your responses can be analysed fully as part of the process.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

Elaine Haste

SCHOOL TRANSPORT, SAFETY AND INDEPENDENT EDUCATION DIVISION

 

Your correspondence has been allocated the reference number

2007/0003184.

 

As you can see this is a standard response that does not answer or concerns or even refer to them. However, it does state their requirement that consultations should adhere to the Cabinet Office code of practice on consultations. AHEd has sent an official complaint to the Better Regulation Executive that this has not been the case in the guidance consultations or in preparations for the coming consultation on elective home education predicated on that consultation.

Comments (1)

Anonymous said

at 9:41 pm on Feb 9, 2007

The usual tripe.
Cut and paste job again.
Ignores the questions and spouts their propoganda.
Oh well, anything else would have shocked us.
What next?

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