Pupils must be able to walk to school safely

Tangmere Primary Academy was the focus this week when I went alongside Councillor Simon Oakley to meet with staff and local residents concerned with the impact of speeding cars in the community, something we’ve been working on since September last year.

A lack of long-term investment in the A27 has seen the village often used as a rat-run for people avoiding traffic, meaning residents are often unable to cross safely and children cannot walk safely to school.

The group have now set up a campaign, led by Sandra, whose grandchildren attend the school, and Headteacher Mr Turney, to implement better signage and reduce speed limits in Tangmere. It’s great to hear that this has the support of many local businesses in

Tangmere and I am fully behind the campaign group and their aims.

Making sure children in our community can walk to school safely is so important, and I will continue to work with the team at Tangmere Primary and the brilliant Councillor Oakley to ensure we make progress on this.

Last week also saw the launch of a new national campaign to improve school attendance. Our fantastic schools and teachers unlock children’s imagination, potential, and social skills, which is why reducing the number of absent days is my number one priority.

Following the pandemic we saw a worldwide rise in school absence driven by broken habits of attendance, and new and exacerbated barriers including mental health. It is good to see school absence rates moving in the right direction from 7.6 per cent to down to 7 per cent, but we know more is needed. As Secretary of State for Education I am expanding our system which will mean every state school in England will now share their daily attendance registers across the education sector.

The sharing of daily school registers will form a new world-leading attendance data set that will help schools spot and support children displaying worrying trends of persistent absence.

When the Government came into office only 68% of schools were rated as good or outstanding, today that stands at 89%, and is even better in Chichester at 90%. I am committed to ensuring that all children, especially the most vulnerable in our society, are safe and have access to an excellent education.