First Minister Mark Drakeford says he will look into recording when children are off school for mental health reasons. His comments come as Education Minister Jeremy Miles sets up a taskforce to help tackle soaring absence rates.
There is growing evidence and concern about the huge scale of mental health problems among pupils since lockdowns and classroom closures. Latest data last week showed absence has doubled and persistent absence tripled to 16.3% in Welsh schools in the last five years.
At the moment there is a code for schools to log absences for illness, but not specifically for what illness, or whether it is for mental health reasons. Responding to a suggestion from Welsh Conservatives leader Andrew RT Davies that a new code should be introduced for logging absences owing to mental health, Mark Drakeford said it is something he will now consider.
Commenting on latest school absence data in Plenary today (Tues Oct 3) Andrew RT Davies noted rising mental health problems among young people since the pandemic. He said: “First Minister, one of the things that surprised me was that there is no mental health absence code.
