Take children on holidays in term-time, says Julia Bradbury
FORMER Countryfile presenter Julia Bradbury has risked angering teachers by insisting parents should flout rules and take their children on holiday during term-time.
The mother-of-three, 46, branded the travel i ndustry ‘ evil’ f or inflating holiday prices during school holidays and said it acted like a ‘child tax’.
At present, parents face a fine for taking their children out of school during term-time, but Miss Bradbury said that many parents don’t have ‘any other choice’.
She told the Mail on Sunday’s Event magazine: ‘Children spend less time outside as part of the school curriculum than prisoners do, which is a frightening thought.
‘I think if the parent has the chance to do something or go somewhere then you should have the right to home-school them to take them on an adventure, which will be edu- cational and eye- opening.’ Miss Bradbury added: ‘We as parents are penalised for taking our children away during holiday periods because travel companies jack up prices so ludicrously. It is completely unfair.
‘It’s a child tax – it’s cynical and the [ travel] industry needs to stop being so evil.
‘If there is a family that cannot afford to go away because prices are four times what they would be in term time, then if I was in their position I would go to my headmaster or headmistress and say I don’t have any other choice, so give me their homework.’
Miss Bradbury also revealed that she left the BBC in 2014 to undergo IVF treatment and could not keep up her filming commitments at the same time.
The fertility treatment was successful and she now has one- year- old twins, Zena and Xanthe, as well as her five-year-old son, Zephyr.