The spike in school suspensions
This Is Why
Sky News
4.0 • 552 Ratings
🗓️ 13 September 2023
⏱️ 24 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
It’s raised concerns these suspended students are slipping through the cracks, but leading teachers say a national shortage of alternative forms of education is putting unprecedented demand on the system.
Today’s Sky News Daily episode features Nick Martin on his investigation into this growing educational crisis, a head teacher trying to provide a new path for troubled children and a mother who fears her child will get left behind.
Podcast Producer: Alex Edden
Interviews Producer: Melissa Tutesigensi
Editor: Wendy Parker
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Stop paying to invest. With free trade, you can invest without the legacy fees, with a free |
| 0:06.9 | ISA, a free pension, and commission-free investing in funds, stocks, ETFs, bonds, and more. |
| 0:15.0 | Join over 1.6 million users on FreeTrades' award-winning free platform. |
| 0:20.4 | Go to freetrade.io slash radio to get started. |
| 0:25.1 | Capital at risk, ICER and SIP rules apply. |
| 0:27.9 | Other charges may apply. |
| 0:30.1 | You know, when Helen used to get home from work, I'd ask, how are you? |
| 0:34.4 | Fine, she'd say. |
| 0:36.1 | She clearly wasn't. |
| 0:42.3 | After 10 years in IT, she was on autopilot. Then she found this job, training up-and-coming tech wizas at the college, same skills but with new people, new challenges. |
| 0:49.8 | Now when she gets back, I get the full debrief. Can't get a word in. |
| 0:55.0 | Give your skills new life. Train others. Search jobs in further education. |
| 1:00.4 | Welcome to The Daily with me Neil Patterson. And today we're returning to a topic we've previously |
| 1:05.5 | covered the significant, indeed historically high level of absence from our schools. |
| 1:11.4 | But we're going to be focusing very specifically on children who've been suspended, |
| 1:15.6 | that is, those who've been asked to leave the school temporarily. |
| 1:19.2 | And figures show that more than a million days of learning were lost last year through suspensions alone. |
| 1:24.9 | These days, pupils who've been suspended or even permanently excluded are |
| 1:29.0 | educated through what's known as alternative provision, a sort of catch-old term, which essentially |
| 1:34.5 | means education outside school arranged by local authorities or schools themselves. But such are |
| 1:41.1 | the numbers being suspended that there is now a lack of alternative provision, |
| 1:45.7 | meaning there are certainly kids falling through the cracks in mainstream education and parents at their wits end. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Sky News, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Sky News and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.