Policy background
- At present, school uniform policy, including its cost, is a matter for a school’s governing body or academy trust. The Department for Education has published non-statutory guidance on school uniform.
- The Department for Education’s non statutory guidance was last updated in 2013 to give extra emphasis to the importance of cost considerations. It makes clear that schools should give high priority to the consideration of cost and value for money for parents.
- In November 2015, the Government published the ‘A Better Deal:’ plan. This included a commitment to put the Department for Education’s existing school uniform guidance on costs on a statutory footing:
"The government wants to ensure that effective competition is used to drive better value for money and will therefore put existing best practice guidance for school uniform supply in England on a statutory footing". - This Act enables the Department for Education to make guidance on the cost considerations of school uniform statutory.
