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West Midlands Liberal Democrats |
KEETCH OPPOSES PROPOSALS TO REGISTER AND MONITOR HOME-EDUCATED CHILDREN
December 16, 2009 12:00 AM
Last week over 70 Members of Parliament presented petitions from more than 120 different constituencies opposing the compulsory registration and monitoring of home-educated children. The previous record for petitions presented in one day was 44 in March 2006. If enacted, the Government's proposals will, for the first time in our history, tear away from parents and give to the state the responsibility for a child's education.
The petition states:
The Petition of persons resident in the Hereford parliamentary constituency,
Declares that they are concerned about the recommendations of the Badman Report, which suggests closer monitoring of home educators, including a compulsory annual registration scheme and right of access to people's homes for local authority officials; further declares that the Petitioners believe the recommendations are based on a review that was extremely rushed, failed to give due consideration to the evidence, failed to ensure that the data it collected were sufficiently robust, and failed to take proper account of the existing legislative framework.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families either not to bring forward, or to withdraw, proposed legislative measures providing for tighter registration and monitoring of children educated at home in the absence of a thorough independent inquiry into the condition and future of elective home education in England; but instead to take the steps necessary to ensure that the existing Elective Home Education Guidelines for Local Authorities are properly implemented, learning from current best practice, in all local authorities in England.
Paul Keetch MP for Hereford has met with representatives of home-educated children in Hereford. Although the MP was unable to present the petitions in person to the Speaker, he made arrangements for them to be presented on his behalf by another Member of Parliament.
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