Letter: Time to use some common sense over in-term holidays

Requests fell into two groups. Those who could not get time off work during a school holiday period and those who simply could not afford to have a holiday at peak times.

The present government regulations now mean that a family cannot even have one school week away, as this amounts to the five consecutive days, unless there are exceptional circumstances. The question is therefore, "What are exceptional circumstances?"

This when one head initially refused to grant permission for a child to attend his mother's wedding and Telford and Wrekin Council prosecuted a family whose father could not have time off during the school holiday period.

My own daughter had the last week off at the end of the summer term once so that she could go abroad with a friend and her family, in my mind a very valuable experience but today I would be fined for that. It would certainly have made a most interesting press headline today.

So what value does the present Government put on family life? How do families and their children who fall into the categories listed above have a family holiday?

Mothers and fathers and their children all need holidays, they need to escape the stresses of modern life, they need to have valuable uninterrupted time together.

Children need to visit different places whether it's a castle in Northumberland or a beach in Greece – it is all part of life's rich pattern. Is it really too much to allow five days away from school? It used to be ten days.

So let us have some common sense and compassion in this matter, something which the present Government generally seems to lack.

John F Marcham, Little Wenlock