holiday fines

LilElvis

zebra wrote: »

To me it's grossly inappropriate interference by the govt to have a blanket ban. My cousins in California are allowed to take their kids out (& often do) during term time. The deal is that the kids get quite a bit of homework from their teachers & need to have a generally good attendance record. It's a much more sensible system than the English pure ban.

So you expect teachers to spend additional time and effort arranging "homework" for children to take on holiday?

FBaby

Our LA allows for 5 days unauthorised absence a year before fining. I wonder why if it is so detrimental to the education of children!

WestonDave

meer53 wrote: »

The petition should be about getting holiday companies to stop ripping families off during school holidays.

Stop and think about that and we might stop having this incessant nonsense.


Holiday company A has an airline seat, and a hotel bed to sell in Spain. Realistically they can only really sell it from May to end of September otherwise the weather isn't up to it. The costs of owning, staffing and maintaining those facilities are such that at present they charge £500 per week in school time and £1000 per week in school holidays - rip off right? Well actually probably not. Last time I looked TUI group were making about £50 per person on their holidays so not a lot of "ripping off" going on - if they made no profit at all it wouldn't help holiday prices.


So back to the numbers. If they manage to get the room etc booked throughout the season they'd have 7 weeks of school holidays and 15 weeks of school term time - total income £14,500. We've already determined there isn't much margin for cutting the overall income from that so if we flat price across the season you wouldn't be paying £500 in school holidays you'd be paying £660. However there is clearly a demand during school holidays which isn't there the rest of the time. At present they can fill their room at £500 and £1000 respectively. Clearly they'd have enough bookings in the holidays at £660 but the chances are that some people who currently go in term time (those with no kids or pre-school kids) might now choose school holiday time as there is no cost advantage to going in term time. That means some families who were happy to pay the full rate will now miss out as there won't be capacity. On the other side of the coin there will now be vacancies in term time because people who were tempted by the significant savings don't book which means the total income falls. Let's say 3 weeks remain vacant. That now means that the £660 x 3 has to be spread over the remaining 19 weeks which adds another £105 onto each week. We've now got a flat rate of £765. That makes going in term time even less attractive and so the cycle continues.


Obviously these are made up numbers but the reality is that the holiday "rip off" simply doesn't exist. In term time the holiday companies get whatever they can (i.e. better than nothing) for rooms etc that there is little demand for whilst the full cost of having them available during school holidays is met by those that want holidays those weeks.

BoJangles_2

Gra76 wrote: »

My wife wouldn't be offended, she knows she twists what I say to suit her... :rotfl:

As for the other people I've supposedly offended...I think you've lost the power of reading. I've no idea where you get that list from, maybe you should add 'religious minorities' and 'childless couples' to the list to complete it.

My entire point is that any parent who's child has high attendance (ie - not a load of unauthorised absences) shouldn't be penalised for taking their kids on a family holiday once a year. How that can offend anyone I've nooooooooo idea...

And you won't be so long as you don't take your kids out during term time...;)

Spendless

DCFC79 wrote: »

You can go with Eurocamp for £624 for 7 nights for 2 adults and 2 children (4-17 years old) in south Brittany for 7 nights in July next year. Haven't looked at travel costs but was just an example of what you can get.

We've just returned, in the last hour from doing something similar to this. Whilst away we had a little bit of internet access and I dipped in and out of this thread, somewhat bemused at times at the view that seemed to be coming across from some on here that it is only educational if being delivered at a school by a teacher and usually in a classroom.

The reason it tickled me, was because we discovered that DD who starts in yr8 tomorrow and has had weekly French lessons for the past year at Secondary, had no idea how to order herself a drink, but knew what the French word was for monkey.

tara747

Simple supply and demand.

Lots of demand for holidays in summer, therefore the price is higher. Less demand for holidays the rest of the year, therefore the price is lower.

If you have school-age kids, they get lots of time off, and you can take them on holiday during those times.

What's the problem here?

maman

tara747 wrote: »

Simple supply and demand.

Lots of demand for holidays in summer, therefore the price is higher. Less demand for holidays the rest of the year, therefore the price is lower.

If you have school-age kids, they get lots of time off, and you can take them on holiday during those times.

What's the problem here?

As I see it, we have parents who want to spend as little as possible on a holiday and aren't prepared to save up and spend the prices charged in school holidays. So even though children have 13 weeks off per year the parents want them to take more.


The government believe that children have more than enough time off to go on a family holiday and in any event it's not good life training to take time off when you don't have leave. So they have tightened up the rules and introduced fines for parents who don't comply.


To support their arguments parents then quickly move on to how useless schools are and how their child will not suffer one tiny bit from going in holiday in term time especially as the holiday is educational.



To me that's the crux of what the argument is all about.


I read yesterday that to support domestic tourism, school holidays in Turkey have been extended by two weeks. Can you just imagine the uproar if that happened here? The very same schools that are useless are suddenly needed to provide childcare. Parents here go spare if schools are closed for a day's snow. Two extra weeks!:eek:

Indie_Kid

Why isn't anyone lobbying the holiday companies?

In fact, it's probably cheaper to just book a hotel and flights for a week than it is to go through one of those companies. We went camping in France at the end of June. Flights were £120 (I think) and camping was about £60 for the week.

Vikipollard

Maman raises a very good point above.

There are already 13 weeks' holiday per year for most state schools. 13 weeks to find childcare for.

But people are advocating having an additional 1-2 weeks off for that 'cheaper' holiday in term time - presumably meaning they have to find/pay for additional child care (not everyone has family to do it for free) in the actual school holidays.

Still looking cheap?

barbarawright

Spendless wrote: »

We've just returned, in the last hour from doing something similar to this. Whilst away we had a little bit of internet access and I dipped in and out of this thread, somewhat bemused at times at the view that seemed to be coming across from some on here that it is only educational if being delivered at a school by a teacher and usually in a classroom.

The reason it tickled me, was because we discovered that DD who starts in yr8 tomorrow and has had weekly French lessons for the past year at Secondary, had no idea how to order herself a drink, but knew what the French word was for monkey.

I haven't seen anyone suggest that education only takes place in schools. But surely parents have evenings and weekends (when they ought to be taking an interest in their children's work - dont' they have to sign homework diaries?) and pretty generous holidays to provide their own education