HUNDREDS of parents in Southampton have been trapped in a major purge on truancy across the city.

More than 850 mums and dads have been slapped with fines because their children missed lessons – that is more than ten times the rest of Hampshire.

The figures show a rise of eight per cent on the number of parents given the £120 penalty notices on the previous year.

And the number of prosecutions – for failure to pay those fines – has risen dramatically, from 206 to 277.

That is a rise of almost 35 per cent.

The city council is pursuing far more parents for truancy than either Hampshire County Council or the Isle of Wight.

Across Hampshire, only 71 fines were imposed in 2011-12 – although this was up from 46 in the previous 12 months.

The council took out only a single prosecution, down from 22 in 2010-11.

Southampton children’s services chief, Councillor Sarah Bogle welcomed the figures.

She said: “We take the subject of truancy seriously and despite the progress we have made, our figures remain higher than the national average.

“We are working with schools to drive home the importance of actually being in classes, so I take this quite positively really.

“It shows that the schools are following through on that and showing some enforcement.”

Cllr Bogle said that Southampton’s truancy rates were 0.8 per cent higher than the national average.

But she insisted that schools were targeting persistent offenders, adding that it was down to staff at individual schools to dish out fines where they deemed it necessary.

She added the rise was unlikely to be due to a tougher line against children taking holidays during term times – often by parents grabbing cheaper package deals abroad.

Cllr Bogle said: “I don’t know the specifics of each school, but my expectation would be that schools know who the persistent offenders are and that they will be working with them the most.

“We trust the schools to know their pupils well enough and know when to take appropriate action.

“It’s certainly not a ‘one strike and you’re out’ system.

We are much more about stressing to children how important attendance is and rewarding good attendance too, not just punishing those who don’t go to school.”

The coalition Government hiked the level of fines last September, from the figures of £50 and £100, respectively, which it inherited from the previous Labour Government.

The fines impose a £60 punishment if they are paid within 28 days, doubling to £120 after that time period – and with prosecution possible after 42 days.

Across England, a record number of fines were imposed – more than 41,000, which was up by more than a quarter on the previous year’s statistics.

Of those, slightly more than half were paid within 28 days and a total of 6,361 parents were prosecuted for non-payment.

A DfE spokesman said: “If children are not in school they cannot learn. Too many children are still missing too many lessons. We must continue to tackle poor attendance and make sure every pupil gets a good education.”

On just one day earlier this month, ten parents were fined for failing to ensure their children attended school.

On March 14 at Southampton Magistrates’ Court, those ten parents pleaded guilty to a total of
18 charges relating to truancy and were fined a total of £1,800 between them.

They were also ordered to pay a total of £120 in victim surcharges and £410 costs.

Two received a six-month conditional discharge which could lead to stronger punishments if they are convicted of the same offence again.

  • Additional reporting by Luke Tugby.

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