England Issues Record 459,000 School Holiday Fines

A record number of parents in England received fines last academic year for taking their children out of school during term time for family holidays, highlighting a sharp increase in enforcement over the past decade. During the 2024-25 school year, local authorities issued 459,000 penalty notices specifically for unauthorised absences due to holidays, equivalent to more than 620 fines for every 10,000 pupils nationwide.

This figure marks the highest on record and continues an upward trend that began before the Covid-19 pandemic but accelerated afterward. In the 2016-17 academic year, when data collection started, only 116,000 such notices were issued. The number more than doubled to 288,000 by 2018-19, the last full year before school closures. It then climbed to 356,000 in 2022-23, 443,000 in 2023-24, and reached the peak last year. The vast majority, 93 percent, of all penalty notices for unauthorised absences relate to term-time holidays, underscoring their prevalence as a reason for truancy.

Enforcement varies significantly by region, with the North of England seeing the highest rates. There, councils and schools issued 110,792 fines, or 817 per 10,000 pupils, compared to...