Taking a child to Florida for seven consecutive days during term time without a school’s permission cannot be lawful, a QC for education chiefs has told the Supreme Court.

The submission was made as Isle of Wight Council, backed by the education secretary, launched a landmark legal battle over term-time holidays in the highest court in the land.

In a case being watched by schools and parents all over the country, the local education authority is seeking to overturn a High Court ruling in May last year that cleared a father, Jon Platt, 46, of failing to ensure his daughter’s regular attendance at school.

Mr Platt won a decision blocking a £120 fine imposed for flying off with his child on a seven-day trip to Disney World in Florida in April 2015.

The High Court, sitting in London, declared that Mr Platt was not acting unlawfully because his daughter had a good attendance record during the rest of the year - over 90 per cent.

That court decision caused a surge in term-time holiday bookings all over England.

Controversy over this issue first arose when the government ordered a crackdown on school absences in 2013.

New guidelines were introduced for English schools which only allow headteachers to permit pupils to miss classes in “exceptional circumstances”.

The Department for Education has told parents that their children missing just a few days in the classroom can damage their GCSE results.

More families are taking term-time breaks

But families have complained that trips in official school holiday periods are up to four times more expensive, and local councils have reported that the number of breaks in term time is increasing.

In a day-long hearing at the Supreme Court, Isle of Wight Council and the education secretary were asking five justices - court president Lord Neuberger, sitting with his deputy Lady Hale and Lords Reed, Mance and Hughes - to rule that the High Court got the law wrong.

The key legal issue is whether or not Mr Platt committed the offence of failing to ensure that his daughter “attended school regularly”, as required by section 444(1) of the 1996 Education Act.

The High Court judges, sitting in London, found that a magistrates’ court had been entitled to decide in October 2015 that Mr Platt had no case to answer when he was prosecuted under the 1996 Act.

Lord Justice Lloyd Jones and Mrs Justice Thirlwall said the magistrates rightly took into account the “wider picture” of the child’s attendance record, including the period outside the dates of the Florida holiday.

But in the Supreme Court, Martin Chamberlain QC, appearing for the council, argued that the High Court had taken a wrong approach, and “regular attendance” meant pupils had to be in class “at all times when required by the school rules”.

Mr Chamberlain added that, in any event, “absence for seven consecutive days cannot on any view be regular attendance”.

Mr Platt was in court and said before the hearing: “If we leave here today with a verdict I would very much like that verdict to be that parents can make the final decision about when it is appropriate for their children to attend school and when it is appropriate for them to have the day off.

“There is a legal requirement to attend school regularly but that has never meant every single (term time) day. If it becomes that after today that would be pretty draconian.”

James Eadie QC, appearing for the Education Secretary, argued it would be “absurd” if parents could head off on holiday with children when “the sun is out and foreign climes beckon” in a way that “undermined” Government policy on unauthorised absences.

Mr Eadie said: “Absence from school can adversely affect a child’s educational attainment. Research indicates that every extra day missed is associated with a lower attainment outcome.”

It also disrupted the education of other children and placed an extra burden on teachers who had to ensure absent pupils caught up on what they had missed.

Mr Eadie said: “Undermining the authority of the school and head teacher and those responsible for running the school is likely to be a thoroughly bad thing.”

Mr Eadie submitted that Parliament did not intend that “a parent has a right to take their child out of school during term time for any reason they judge appropriate - in this case for the purpose of going on holiday to Florida - and to do so irrespective of the judgment of the school as to whether or not authorisation should be given”.

Clive Sheldon QC, appearing for Mr Platt, said it was the education authorities who were now putting forward a new and radical interpretation of the law which was absurd and would “penalise millions of people”.

Mr Sheldon said it was being suggested by the Isle of Wight and the Education Secretary that “even one day’s (unauthorised) absence” meant there had been a failure to attend school regularly and a criminal offence committed.

If that was right, said the QC, “the effect would be to criminalise parents on an unprecedented scale”.

He said there were 4.1m days of unauthorised absence from state-funded schools in the 2015 autumn term. On the Government’s argument, that meant “there were 4.1m criminal offences committed during one term”.

Mr Sheldon said: “If the Government wishes to change the law and criminalise each day’s unauthorised absence then what it ought to do, rather than come before this court and argue something we say offends all principles..., is to introduce fresh legislation to this effect.”

At the end of the hearing, Lord Neuberger said the court would give its judgment “in due course” at a later date.

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