Home education and Children Act referrals

1.Please provide details of how many home educated children are in your local authority area as at 1st January 2019, or the closest available date.

On 1/01/19 there were 1222 registered EHE students.

2. Please state how many children aged 5 -16 there are in your area. As at 1st January 2019, or the closest possible date.

86,807 children aged 5 to 16 (as at 31/08/18) on roll at Devon LA maintained schools and Academies as at Autumn School Census (04/10/18). Please note this does not equate to the number of children living in the area as there will be some children attending non Devon LA schools, independent and non maintained schools. I’ve copied the education systems mailbox into this email in case they can give you a more accurate figure from the ONE system, covering a wider range of establishments and with a date closer to the one requested in the FOI.

3. Please state how many children there are in your area aged under 5 years in your area. As at 1st January 2019, or the closest possible date.

Unfortunately we can’t use the school census for this as it only captures those attending LA Maintained schools and Academies, whereas a large number of under 5 year olds would be attending early years providers or not attending any establishment (non-statutory school age). The Education Systems team should be able to provide this information as they can access the ONE database which I believe holds information on children attending early years providers and other pre-school age children.

4. Please provide details of how many referrals you have received during the last full twelve month period for which you have records available, where you have reasonable cause to suspect that a child (who lives or is found in your area) is suffering or is likely to suffer significant harm, for which investigations have been carried out. Children Act 1989 s47 referrals.

For the year 01/04/17-31/03/18 1408 referrals resulted in a S47 enquiry within the year.

5. Please state how many of these referrals relate to children aged under 5 years.

400 of these referrals related to children under 5 years (including unborn children)

6. Please state how many of these referrals relate to home educated children.

45

7. Please state how many of those referrals relate to children aged 5 -16 years attending school.

503

8. Please state how many of those referrals for children under 5 years of age have led to a child protection plan.

140 of the referrals for children under 5 years (including unborn children) led to a child protection plan.

9. Please state how many of those referrals for home educated children have led to a child protection plan.

7

10. Please state how many of those referrals for children aged 5 -16 years attending school, have led to a child protection plan.

139