One in six parents believe school summer holidays should be cancelled

The survey of more than 7,500 parents found that 18 percent of UK parents think that the school summer holidays should be cancelled as result of lockdown.

Three-quarters (75 percent) of the parents who answered ‘yes’ to the question, ‘Should the school summer holidays be cancelled?’, believe children have missed enough school and need to spend the summer catching up.

A further 44 percent stated they think the Government should open more temporary schools in order to allow children to return safely as soon as possible.

Richard Conway, founder of Childcare.co.uk, said, ‘After a few unpredictable months we are now starting to move out of lockdown, however with the summer holidays around the corner naturally the question being asked is will children still have a summer break, or will schools remain open to catch up on time missed in the classroom?

‘We wanted to find out how parents felt about the subject, with many understandably concerned about the impact school closures is having on their children’s education. That being said, it was still surprising to see that one in six parents think schools should open over the summer holidays to compensate for the loss classroom time of the last few months.’

Prime minister Boris Johnson said in Wednesday's daily briefing that the government would be doing 'a huge amount of catch up for pupils over the summer'.

More details are expected to be announced by the education secretary next week.