Take part in school uniform consultation

Tackling the cost-of-living crisis and helping families save money is one of the Greens’ top priorities in government.

This month we have taken another step forward in an area I’ve campaigned on for a number of years, the cost of the school day.

We’ve already taken action to roll out free school meals for P1-5 pupils, to be followed by P6 and 7 as soon as possible, delivered free bus travel for young people (freebus.scot) and increased the School Clothing Grant.

Now we’re moving on to another Green manifesto commitment, reducing the cost of school uniforms.

A survey carried out across the UK by the Children’s Society back in 2020 showed that parents spend an average of £337 per year on school uniform for a secondary school child and £315 for each primary school child.

This is unreasonable, unfair and is simply beyond the financial means of many parents and carers.

Whilst I am proud that we have increased the grant available to support the purchase of school uniforms to £120 for primary pupils and £150 for secondary, if we were to continue increasing it we would just be using public money to line the pockets of the private companies who supply the uniforms.

Instead, we are capping the cost of uniforms in the first place.

Earlier this month the Scottish Government launched a consultation on how new school uniform guidance could do this, as well as address a number of equalities issues such as gendered school uniform policies which see girls and young women end up paying more than boys and young men.

This guidance will be issued to school when they are setting their uniform policies.

There are a number of great ideas that I hope will come out of this consultation.

For example, a number of schools have exclusive agreements with particular providers for everything from polo shirts to blazers, removing the option of shopping around for a better price.

There’s also so much more that can be done to re-use uniforms and promote the use of second-hand items.

I’m keen to see this guidance apply to PE kits as well, given the extra cost they entail for many families.

For this guidance to be as strong as possible we need lots of responses to the consultation.

You can do so by going to consult.gov.scot and searching for ‘school uniform’ or emailing includeu@gov.scot