Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 Part 2

This article, the second in our three-part series, continues our review of the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026.

Part 2 of the Act represents one of the most significant changes to education policy in England for many years. While some individual measures, such as breakfast clubs or mobile phone guidance, have received public attention, the wider significance of Part 2 is much broader.

Taken together, the reforms signal a clear shift towards:

• greater national consistency,
• stronger government oversight,
• increased local authority coordination,
• and reduced fragmentation across the school system.

In many ways, the legislation begins moving England away from the highly autonomous academy-led system that developed over the last decade and towards a more regulated, integrated and centrally directed education framework.

Importantly, many sections of the Act do not simply introduce immediate operational changes. Instead, the legislation is increasingly creating legal frameworks, duties and powers that allow for future regulation, intervention and policy development. Across Part 2, the direction of travel is clear: HM Government is putting in place the legislative foundations for stronger oversight, greater safeguarding visibility and more coordinated national expectations across education.

A Stronger Focus on Child Welfare and Inclusion

One of the clearest themes running throughout Part 2 is the idea that schools are not simply educational institutions, but key safeguarding and wellbeing services.

This can be seen in the introduction of universal breakfast club duties for primary schools, expanded free school meal eligibility and stronger allergy safety requirements. The legislation increasingly treats issues such as hunger, medical safety, attendance and access to education as part of a wider wellbeing and safeguarding framework rather than simply operational school matters.

The allergy safety provisions are particularly significant because they move beyond guidance alone and create a clearer legal framework around allergy management, anaphylaxis preparedness, staff training and policy publication. The legislation also creates powers for future regulations, meaning schools are likely to see increasingly detailed national expectations around safety in the coming years.

Similarly, the mobile phone provisions are less about introducing an outright ban and more about establishing a national framework for future expectations around device use, online safety, distraction, behaviour and wellbeing in schools.

Children Not in School: A Fundamental Safeguarding Reform

Perhaps the most significant area within Part 2 is the completely new legal framework relating to children not in school and elective home education.

The legislation introduces one of the biggest expansions of local authority oversight powers in this area for decades. At its core is a clear policy message: children should not become ‘invisible’ to education and safeguarding systems simply because they are educated outside mainstream school settings.

The Act creates:

• mandatory local authority registers for children not in school,
• stronger duties on parents to provide information,
• powers to obtain information from tutors and out-of-school providers,
• expanded information-sharing powers,
• and stronger school attendance order arrangements.

Importantly, the reforms go beyond education alone. Much of the framework is clearly driven by safeguarding concerns, particularly around children who may be vulnerable, isolated, missing education or outside professional oversight.

The legislation also significantly changes the balance between parental choice and state oversight. While home education remains lawful, the Act increases the ability of local authorities to monitor educational arrangements, assess suitability and intervene where concerns exist.

This is especially clear in the new rules requiring local authority consent before some vulnerable children can be withdrawn from school for home education, particularly where safeguarding concerns, SEND vulnerability, or previous child protection involvement exist.

Taken together, these reforms suggest the legislation is establishing the infrastructure for far greater long-term oversight of children outside mainstream education. The wider direction of travel is clear: safeguarding visibility, information-sharing and educational oversight are becoming increasingly connected.

Information-Sharing and Visibility

Another major theme throughout Part 2 is the removal of barriers between agencies and systems.

The legislation repeatedly strengthens powers for schools, local authorities, safeguarding agencies, regulators and government bodies to share information where it supports education, welfare or safeguarding functions.

This reflects growing national concern that children can become vulnerable when agencies hold disconnected information or when no single organisation has a complete picture of risk.

The children-not-in-school framework particularly reflects this shift. The Act effectively creates a national visibility and oversight system for children educated outside mainstream school settings, supported by:

• mandatory information-sharing,
• national guidance,
• registration systems,
• and stronger enforcement powers.

Much like Part 1 of the Act, the legislation appears to be laying the groundwork for increasingly integrated digital safeguarding and educational oversight systems in the future.

A More Regulated Academy System

One of the most politically significant themes within Part 2 is the clear reduction in some traditional academy freedoms.

Over recent years, academies have often operated with greater flexibility around the curriculum, staffing, admissions, teacher qualifications, pay and conditions, and local authority involvement. Part 2 begins to narrow many of those differences.

The legislation introduces powers allowing stronger regulation of teacher qualifications and induction in academies, greater alignment of teacher pay and conditions, direct application of the National Curriculum to academy schools, stronger government intervention powers over academy trusts, and direct inspection of academy proprietors and multi-academy trusts by Ofsted.

Taken together, these reforms suggest a major policy shift. The academy system is increasingly being treated less as a largely autonomous contractual model and more as a nationally regulated public education system.

The introduction of direct Ofsted inspection of academy trusts is particularly significant. Previously, accountability focused mainly on individual schools. The Act now creates formal trust-level accountability around leadership, governance, safeguarding, wellbeing and school improvement.

At the same time, the legislation strengthens the Secretary of State’s powers to intervene directly where academy trusts fail to meet legal or safeguarding obligations. This reflects increasing concern nationally around governance failures, inconsistency across trusts and fragmented oversight structures.

Again, many of these provisions are enabling powers. The Act is not only changing current expectations, but creating the legal basis for future national standards, intervention frameworks and accountability systems across the academy sector.

The Act also signals an important change in school improvement policy. One of the most symbolic reforms is the repeal of the automatic duty to issue Academy Orders for schools causing concern. Under previous legislation, many failing maintained schools were effectively required to become academies. Part 2 removes that automatic requirement.

This does not end academisation or remove intervention powers, but it does suggest a shift away from the idea that academy conversion should always be the default solution to school improvement.

Similarly, the legislation removes the long-standing ‘academy presumption’ for new schools, giving local authorities greater flexibility to establish maintained schools as well as academies.

Taken together, these changes suggest a broader move towards a more mixed and locally coordinated school system rather than one driven primarily by structural academisation.

Local authorities also gain stronger powers to direct academies to admit vulnerable or hard-to-place pupils. This reflects increasing concern that fragmented admissions systems can leave some children without suitable education or create barriers for vulnerable learners.

The wider message is increasingly clear throughout Part 2: all publicly funded schools are expected to operate not simply as individual institutions, but as part of a wider local education and safeguarding system with shared responsibilities towards children and communities.

Overall, Part 2 of the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 represents a major rebalancing of the English education system.

The legislation does not remove academies, parental choice or school autonomy entirely. However, it clearly moves the system towards greater national consistency, stronger safeguarding oversight, increased local coordination, and clearer collective responsibilities across education.

Perhaps most significantly, the Act increasingly connects education policy with safeguarding, wellbeing, attendance, inclusion and public accountability. The direction of travel suggests a future system where schools are viewed not only as autonomous institutions, but as integrated parts of wider local safeguarding and children’s services systems.

Sam Preston (Safeguarding Director) & Sara Spinks (SSS Author and Former Headteacher)

3 June 2026