This news story
was widely reported. This one is taken from the Daily Mail because their
graphic is useful:
Now end the school holiday rip-offs: Parents hit
out at having to pay more for breaks after the Supreme Court rules children
CAN'T miss lessons
Travel companies must
stop ripping off families for breaks during school holidays following a
landmark Supreme Court ruling, critics demanded last night.
Parents, heads and
politicians called on ministers to ‘cap’ the price of summer getaways, which
can rise by more than £1,000 at the end of term.
Firms were accused of
‘holding law-abiding parents to ransom’ after a father yesterday lost his fight
against a £60 fine for an unauthorised term-time trip.
The ruling means
families will face a fine or prosecution if pupils take even half a day off
without permission. Parents now have little choice but to book within school
holidays, leaving them at the mercy of travel firms charging sky-high prices.
Lib Dem education spokesman John Pugh said ‘greedy’ firms must ‘stop exploiting
hardworking parents’.
‘Travel companies are
holding law-abiding parents to ransom,’ he said. ‘They should be forced to cap
the cost of trips in school holidays so they are not so completely out of step
with holidays a week earlier or a week later. Travel companies should not be
allowed to profiteer off the back of hardworking parents.’
Nearly 150,000 families
were issued penalties for taking children out of school without permission
during term time in the last school year – raking in a total of almost
£9million for 145 councils in England, according to The Independent.
Questions:
Clearly, we can
fill in the gaps in the image. Are there
any other questions we can ask/answer?
- If you treat the £60 as an additional cost for the price of your June holiday (which becomes £120 because the figures assume a family of two adults, two children), how much does it increase the cost of each holiday?
- What is slightly odd about the figures about the number of fines?
Answers:
The full image
is below. Note that the while the
percentages can be calculated in a way that agrees with the newspaper’s
figures, the other values can’t (because of rounding issues). The upper/lower bounds could be calculated if
you wish …
The £120 of
fines increases the cost of each of the holidays by:
8%
15%
3%
4%
2%
£9 million
divided by 150,000 families is £60 each.
This would mean each family was fined for taking exactly one child out
of school. It seems a little surprising
that none of the families had more than one child. Presumably this has just been clumsily
phrased in the article and should read “Nearly 150,000 penalties were issued for
taking children out of school…”.
