After being called out as little as two weeks ago by Victoria Derbyshire on Newsnight for denying he called the Privileges Committee a ‘kangaroo court‘, Isle of Wight Conservative MP, Bob Seely, has once again come under fire for making claims that, once fact checked, are inaccurate and misleading say Full Fact.
During the Parliamentary debate on 19th June focused on the report from the Privileges Committee about Boris Johnson’s behaviour, the Isle of Wight MP claimed that following the Covid Pandemic school closures, a staggering 100,000 “ghost kids” had disappeared from school registers.
Misleading claims
The MP’s statement, according to Full Fact, an independent fact-checking organisation, is misleading, creating a need for clarification.
What’s surprising about Bob Seely recently making these claims in Parliament is that he’d been informed in February 2022 by Full Fact that his claim was incorrect, following a similar statement by him.
A search for clarity
Full Fact’s examination shows that the 100,000 figure does not refer to the number of students who left school during pandemic school closures. Instead, it reflects the number of children in England who missed at least half of their possible school sessions just in the 2020 Autumn term. While this 93k figure is alarming, it doesn’t mean they left school.
The precise number of children who left school rolls during Covid-19 school closures and never returned to education is still unknown. As Full Fact noted, there are no available statistics to establish this figure.
Misused statistics fuels misunderstanding
A spokesperson for the MP justified to Full Fact Mr Seely’s claim by saying that this is a “figure that Bob’s heard” and that it’s been commonly used in public discourse, originating from the Children’s Commissioner (Dame Rachel de Souza).
However, when Full Fact challenged Ms de Souza for making the claim that between 80,000 and 100,000 children were “not even on any school roll” following national Covid-19 Lockdowns, Ms de Souza’s office admitted that she had “misspoke” during a live interview.
Despite being made aware of the fact check on Ms de Souza’s claim, Mr Seely has continued to make similar assertions, ignoring calls to correct his claim publicly.
The origin of the 100,000 figure
So where did the 100,000 figure come from? Full Fact explain that it gained traction in the summer of 2021, following a report by the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ).
The report noted that between September and December 2020, 93,514 pupils in England were “severely absent”, meaning they attended school less often than they missed it.
Understanding what “severely absent” means
It’s essential to clarify that “severely absent” does not imply children who left school during lockdown and never returned.
Instead, it denotes the number of pupils who attended fewer than 50 per cent of available sessions in Autumn 2020.
In addition, the number of severely absent children was not zero before the pandemic. In the last full year before the pandemic—2018/19—60,247 students missed at least half of the sessions.
Response from MP
News OnTheWight has written to Bob Seely to ask:
Why did you continue to quote numbers of ‘Ghost pupils’ in Parliament that you had previously been told were incorrect and misleading by Full Fact?
Shouldn’t MPs be informed by facts from an official source before speaking in Parliament, rather than just repeating figures that they’ve “heard”?
He has failed to respond. We’ll update if we hear back from him.
Read the Full Fact report. Read the Parliamentary Debate on Hansard.
Our thanks to News OnTheWight reader and contributor, Maggie Nelmes, for the heads up.
Image: © Parliament TV
