The Children’s Society and The Runnymede Trust have called for the Government to set targets to lower the disproportionately high exclusion rate of African Caribbean pupils - six times that of their white counterparts. Current targets set for local authorities are general, and local authorities are not required to keep any record of the ethnicity of excluded pupils. At a conference on Thursday, the charities demanded that specific targets be set for black exclusions to monitor their link to racial tension and truancy.