I am here today to talk to you about what the Government is doing to tackle truancy.

[In Government, the Cabinet Office takes the lead in co-ordinating activity on social exclusion. And it is as a Minister in that Department that I have an interest in the issue of truancy.]

Before I talk about what the Government is doing, I want to say a little about the extent of truancy, and the effects of truancy.

The extent of truancy today is still truly shocking. We know that:

• on any one day, 400,000 pupils who should be in school are absent. And about 50,000 of these are away without permission.

• Over five million half-day sessions are missed on average each year in primary schools because of truancy. For secondary schools, the figure is just over nine million. That represents a staggering 900,000 missed weeks of schooling.

• In inner cities the rates for unauthorised absence are up to 33% higher than the national figure.

But that’s not all. According to surveys of young people, actual truancy levels are higher than official statistics suggest as many pupils who skip lessons engage in "post-registration" truancy. 90% of truants have done this.

So it is clear that truancy is taking place on a massive scale. This truancy has a number of effects. Most of you are all-too-familiar with the effects of truancy, but I think it is worth reminding ourselves of what those effects are:

Firstly, the many children in this country who regularly play truant will probably never develop a love of learning.

That, in itself, represents a real human tragedy. And, frankly, that alone would be reason enough for us to do everything we possibly can to tackle truancy.

But that is in fact only the tip of the iceberg when we look at the effects of truancy on individuals and on society as a whole. The effects on the individuals concerned are clear:

• Truants are more likely than non-truants to leave school with few or no qualifications;

• Young people who have played truant are more likely to be unemployed than those who have not; and

• Those who miss school are much more likely to become homeless later in life.

And what about the effects of truancy on society? The costs of crime and the fear of crime are enormous, and the effects of crime on victims can be absolutely devastating. The links between truancy and crime are well documented:

• Truants are more than three times more likely to offend than non-truants;

• In 1996, 23% of young people who were sentenced in court had engaged in truancy to a significant degree;

• Last year in London, 40% of all street robberies, 25% of burglaries and one third of car thefts were committed by 10 - 16 year olds, many of whom were regular truants.

Society also loses out economically through truancy. We can only guess at the losses to the labour market and the Exchequer that result from truancy-related underachievement.

These are the effects of truancy. And these are the reasons why the Government is absolutely determined to tackle truancy.

So what has the Government been doing?

In 1998 we set ourselves the tough target of reducing the levels of truancy by one-third by 2002. Since then we have put a great deal of effort into tackling truancy.

Our strategy document – Tackling Truancy Together – was launched in 1999 to identify the ways in which schools, police and magistrates can work together to tackle truancy and help to eradicate its effects. Your feedback to that document has proved vital in helping us to develop our policies.

It was also the impetus for a major campaign on truancy. You will remember the announcement by David Blunkett and Jack Straw in October last year of a nation-wide crackdown on truancy backed up by increased funding. The key elements of this drive include:

• a co-ordinated nationwide programme of truancy sweeps;

• tough rules to bring parents of persistent truants to court

• an extra £43 million to tackle poor behaviour, with truancy the top priority

• extra Learning Mentors in Excellence in Cities Areas

• schools with above average truancy records are to be set new targets for attendance

We’ve also placed a renewed emphasis on getting parents to take their responsibilities seriously. Truancy sweeps carried out by police and education welfare officers are finding that the majority of children stopped are with their parents.

We recognise the enormous efforts that schools and LEAs have made to try to engage with these parents before resorting to the final sanction of legal action. We have supported schools in their efforts by imposing sanctions on those parents who refuse to co-operate, in the form of Parenting Orders.

Parenting Orders for school attendance offences have been in place since June 2000. And extra training for magistrates and justices’ clerks as well as national, regional and local training for Education Welfare Services is underway to ensure that the Parenting Orders are used to best effect.

So that is what we have been doing. The next question is how successful have we been in tackling truancy. Well, speaking perfectly honestly, I think there’s good news and bad news.

I shall start with the good news.

There is evidence that the Parenting Orders, which I have just described, have had a positive impact on parental responsibility – particularly where there are siblings.

There is evidence of successful initiatives. Earlier this month I visited the Truancy Watch scheme in York to see first hand how they have gone about tackling truancy in that city. I was incredibly impressed by what they have achieved. As you may know, as part of Truancy Watch, all children seen in the city during school hours are stopped and questioned by police officers and education social workers – even if they are accompanied by an adult. Those without a valid excuse for absence are immediately returned to school. Over the two years this scheme has been running, crime committed by school-age children during school time is down by 67%.

There are other signs of success too. A report from Ofsted published last month, called ‘Improving Attendance and Behaviour in Secondary Schools’ observed that many schools have made significant improvements from very low levels of attendance through concerted and persistent efforts.

Today you will have the chance to hear and read about other success stories from the London area – today is a great opportunity to share best practice.

Now for the bad news.

The bad news is that overall national rates of truancy have remained fairly constant. The percentage of half days lost through truancy is still 0.7%.

So we need to do more. And we are doing more.

We’ve introduced the new higher level of offence for the parents of persistent truants from the 1^st of this month.

At the moment, some four in five of parents summonsed to court under school attendance offences don’t attend. The new higher offence will allow courts to order parents of persistent non-attenders to attend court or face arrest. It will also allow Magistrates to consider alternative sentences such as community service or parenting orders.

A pilot devolution of the education welfare service into schools is also currently underway. We’ve recognised that education welfare is a key partner in the Connexions Service which comes into effect next month and has reducing truancy as one of its primary targets.

We recently appointed a team of specialist truancy and attendance advisers to work within the DfEE. They are there to work with LEAs and schools with high truancy rates to help them tackle truancy.

And we have just finished consulting on the proposal to set targets for reducing truancy for all schools with above average unauthorised attendance rates. The first targets should be in place in September 2001.

So what about the resources to support this work? We’ve put a lot of new financial resources in place to help tackle truancy and meet our tough targets.

• The Standards Fund grant for tackling truancy, improving discipline and educating excluded pupils will total £174 million in 2001-2.

• This year £131 million of the £140 million available in the ‘Social Inclusion: Pupil Support Standards Fund Grant’ is being spent on these issues. Under the reformed Standards Fund, drugs education will be separately funded in future and this means spending on truancy and educating excluded pupils will rise by £43 million next year. This is ten times the amount spent available in 1996-97 and will enable schools and local authorities to set up more innovative projects to improve school attendance.

• The Children’s Fund will provide £450million to support families and ensure that vulnerable children get the best start in life, remain on track in their early years, flourish in secondary school and choose to stay on in education and training at 16.

• In addition, the Home Office is putting in resources to support strategies such as On Track and the Crime Reduction in Secondary Schools programme, which help young people to stay out of trouble.

So, I have set out what the Government is doing at a central level to tackle truancy.

But this is not a battle which can be won in Whitehall.

It is in the classrooms of our schools and on the streets of Britain that the fight against truancy must be won. You are the people who fight this battle every day.

That is why we want to make sure that you get the support you need to bring down truancy in your area.

I hope that today we can begin to provide you with some of that additional support and determination you need.

In your delegate packs you will find a booklet that highlights some of the good practice taking place in schools as well as our latest leaflet, ‘Together We Can Tackle It.’ This outlines ideas of how the police and schools are working together to tackle truancy, crime and disorder.

Today you will also have the opportunity, in your local groupings, to continue or, in some cases, begin the process of producing a joint strategy for your area which will enable you to reduce truancy and crime.

But we want to do more than help spread best practice. We want to listen to you and to help you to overcome problems.

We’ll be coming back to you in six months time to find out how these discussions have led to practical action on the ground and I’ll look forward to seeing feedback from that review.

Let me finish now by thanking you for all your continued hard work.

At times you may feel that your efforts are producing little effect. At times you may feel that your efforts are not appreciated by anyone.

Well let me tell you that people do appreciate your hard work, and we do thank you for it.

And let me say one final thing.

For every single child you get back into the classroom, you deserve to feel proud. Because that child will have a much better chance of leading a happy and successful life.

And I am convinced that by working together you can get many more children back into the classroom and have a real impact on truancy levels. And if you can do that, you will have made an invaluable contribution

• to tackling social exclusion,

• to improving the quality of life of millions of people, and

• and to making Britain the sort of place that we all want our children to grow up in.

Thank you very much.