Citation, commencement and extent

1. These Regulations may be cited as the Education (School Hours and Policies) (Information) Regulations 1989 and shall come into force on 1st April 1989.

Interpretation

2.-(1) In these Regulations -“

"the Act" means the Education Reform Act 1988;

"the 1981 Regulations" means the Education (School Information) Regulations 1981(3);

"education authority" means a local education authority;

"relevant education authority", in relation to a school, means the education authority by whom the school is maintained;

"maintained school" has the meaning assigned to it by section 25(1) of the Act;

"school prospectus" means a document of the kind referred to in paragraph (3) of Regulation 6 of the 1981 Regulations or (as the case may be) a document of a like nature which the governing body of a grant-maintained school are required by the school's articles of government to publish;

"governors' report" means a report of the kind referred to in section 30 of the Education (No.2) Act 1986(4) or section 58(5)(j) of the Act (as the case may be).

(2) In these Regulations, unless the context otherwise requires, any reference to a numbered regulation is a reference to the regulation bearing that number in these Regulations and any reference in a regulation to a numbered paragraph is to the paragraph of that regulation bearing that number.

Information to be made available by head teachers

3.-(1) The head teacher of every maintained school shall make available to parents of pupils at the school and other persons the information specified in paragraph (2) in the manner specified in paragraph (3).

(2) The information referred to in paragraph (1) is information consisting of -“

(a)the times at which each school session begins and ends on a school day, and

(b)particulars of the charging and remissions policies determined by the governing body of the school under section 110 of the Act.

(3) Copies of the information shall be provided at the school for inspection by parents and other persons at all reasonable times on a school day and for distribution without charge to parents on request.

Information to be made available by education authorities

4.-(1) Every education authority shall make available information consisting of particulars of the charging and remissions policies determined by the authority under section 110 of the Act to the persons and in the manner specified in paragraph (2).

(2) Copies of the particulars shall be made available -“

(a)for distribution without charge to parents on request, and for reference by parents and other persons -“

(i)at the offices of the relevant education authority, and

(ii)at every school maintained by the relevant education authority, and

(b)for reference by parents and other persons at the public libraries in the area of that authority.

Changes in information to which Regulation 3(2)(b) applies

5.-(1) This Regulation applies to any significant change to the information to which Regulations 3(2)(b) applies which takes place after publication of the school prospectus in any school year but before completion of the preparation of the governors' report in that year.

(2) The governing body shall make available particulars of any such change at the same time, in the same manner, and to the same extent that they are required by the articles of government for the school to make copies of the governors' report available.

Amendment of the 1981 Regulations

6.-(1) The following paragraph shall be substituted for paragraph (3) of Regulation 6 of the 1981 Regulations -“

"(3) In the case of any school -“

(a)such information shall be published in a single document to be known as the school prospectus; and

(b)copies shall be made available at the school for distribution without charge to parents on request and for reference by parents and other persons."

(2) After paragraph 13 of Schedule 1 to the 1981 Regulations there shall be added the following paragraph -“

"13A. The arrangements for parents and other persons to obtain copies of and to refer to particulars of the charging and remissions policies determined by the authority under section 110 of the Education Reform Act 1988(5)".

(3) After paragraph 13 of Schedule 2 to the 1981 Regulations there shall be added the following paragraph -“

"13A.-(1) The times at which each school session begins and ends on a school day.

(2) A summary of the charging and remissions policies determined by the governing body of the school under section 110 of the Education Reform Act 1988."

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations, which apply to schools maintained by local education authorities and to grant-maintained schools, impose obligations on head teachers, school governing bodies and local education authorities to make information available about school hours and charging and remissions policies.

The head teacher is required to make available to parents and others details of the times at which each school session begins and ends, and of the school governing body's charging and remissions policies determined under section 110 of the Education Reform Act 1988. This information is to be available for inspection at the school and parents are entitled to a free copy of it (regulation 3).

Local education authorities are required to make available details of their charging and remissions policies at specified locations (regulation 4).

If any change takes place in the governors' charging or remissions policies after the school prospectus has been published but before the governors' report has been completed, they are required to provide details of the change with their report (regulation 5).

The Education (School Information) Regulations 1981 are amended -“

(a)so as to require the publication of information to which those and these regulations apply in a document to be known as a prospectus;

(b)by adding to the general information required by those regulations to be published by a local education authority details of the authority's arrangements for publicising their charging and remissions policies; and

(c)by adding to the specific information required to be published about individual schools information about school hours and the charging and remissions policies adopted by the governing body of each school.