Why school’s NOT out for summer babies: Parents no longer get the automatic right to defer their little one’s reception school place

• Legislation to guarantee summer-born kids to start school at 5 to be scrapped 
• Research indicates summer-born kids do worse in exams than autumn-born kids 
• Govt thinks councils more lenient to parent requests to hold summer kids back 

Summer-born children will no longer get the automatic right to defer their reception school place following a Government U-turn yesterday.

For years, ministers had been plotting legislation to force all councils to accept deferrals. It followed a long campaign by parents who felt their children were not ready to start school because they were the youngest in their year.

Currently, children start school in the autumn after they turn four, but parents of those born between April and August can ask to delay entry for a year.

However requests are not always accepted, so in 2015 the then-schools minister Nick Gibb promised to introduce legislation to ensure summer babies could be admitted into reception aged five if that is what their parents wanted.

But yesterday academies minister Baroness Barran announced the U-turn, suggesting councils are now much more lenient than in 2015, so legislation may not be needed. Pauline McDonagh Hull, of the Summer Born Campaign, said: ‘After years of empty promises the Government has committed to inequities for summer-born children indefinitely.’

The government has announced that summer-born children will no longer get the automatic right to defer their reception school place

‘The DfE provides no circumstance in which it is in a child’s best interests to miss a year of school, yet allows headteachers and councils to implement this against parents’ wishes.

‘This latest development is a travesty.

‘Broken promises mean the postcode and birth lotteries will be exacerbated.’

Previous research has indicated that those born in the summer months may perform worse in assessments than their older, autumn-born classmates.

The difference is so stark that some schools are disproportionately labelling summer-born children as having special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).

According to the London School of Economics, 26 per cent of summer-born girls are given SEND support at some point during primary school, compared to 16 per cent of autumn-born girls.

And a study by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) found pupils born in August are less likely to get good GCSEs or go to university than those born in September.

Campaigners say the difference in educational achievement is down to summer-born children being less ‘school ready’ in reception.

Currently, children start school in the autumn after they turn four, but parents of those born between April and August can ask to delay entry for a year

They can be smaller than their classmates, less confident, have a smaller vocabulary and may still struggle with the basic skills needed for lessons.

In 2014, the DfE amended its admissions code to require councils to take parents’ views into account when making decisions on whether to delay reception.

The following year, then schools minister Nick Gibb wrote to councils saying that children should not be forced to join Year 1 if they wait to start school when they turn five.

He also promised to introduce legislation to enforce this.

A 2018 survey found 63 per cent of councils do not approve all requests, and 26 per cent only allow those with a very strong case.

Councils refusing to comply often tell parents that if they insist on a delayed entry, their child must start in Year 1 – missing a year of schooling.

Yesterday’s U-turn was announced by academies minister Baroness Barran.

Academies Minister Baroness Barran (pictured in 2017) made the announcement

She suggested that councils are now much more respectful of parents’ wishes than they were in 2015, and therefore legislation may not be needed.

She said: ‘The system for summer-born admissions is now working much better than it was in 2015.

‘I am reassured that good progress has been made on this issue and that these improvements suggest the system is now working well.

‘Taking all of this into account, I do not intend to continue to pursue legislation on this issue at this time, but will keep this position under review if the situation changes.’

She said that in 2020, 22 per cent of councils had a policy of agreeing to any request to admit five-year-old summer-born children to reception, up from 9 per cent in 2019.

She also said most requests for delayed entry to reception are now approved, with almost nine in ten approved annually.

However, the Summer Born Campaign said this data is ‘based on responses from a minority of admissions authorities, and do not align with the experiences in our group of almost 19,000 parents.’ 

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