Harrison & Harrison v. Stevenson on "Suitable Education"

Harrison and Harrison v Stevenson (1982) QB (DC) 729/81

From the Elective Home Education Guidelines 2006: 

"A clearer interpretation of the meaning of some terminology used in the 1944 Education Act (repealed by the 1996 Act), was gained in the case of Harrison & Harrison v Stephenson (appeal to Worcester Crown Court 1981). The term 'suitable education' was defined as one which enabled the children ‘to achieve their full potential’, and was such as ‘to prepare the children for life in modern civilised society’. The term 'efficient' was defined as achieving ‘that which it sets out to achieve’."From the Badman Review 2009:

Case law offers some insight: 

“...in our judgement “education” demands at least an element of supervision; merely to allow a child to follow its own devices in the hope that it will acquire knowledge by imitation, experiment or experience in its own way and in its own good time is neither systematic nor instructive…such a course would not be education but, at best, child-minding.”

See EO Website for further information.

How this is interpreted by LAs.

eg: Leicestershire LA Policy (2017):Case law (Harrison v. Stevenson) also states that a suitable education – for a child capable of learning such skills – should instil in them the ability to read, write and cope with arithmetical problems. In other words, an education that does not include English and Maths cannot be considered suitable.