City of Sanctuary have supported the open letter from Against Borders for Children to the Rt Hon Justine Greening MP opposing the collection of nationality and country of birth data in the Early Years Census and School Census.  From September 2016 parents, guardians and carers in England were asked to state if their children are foreign nationals. Families can refuse to answer.

The UK Government has required childminders, nurseries, schools and colleges to collect country-of-birth and nationality data for children aged between 2 and 19.  The campaign  believes that this policy is unnecessary, divisive and puts vulnerable children at risk.

However, families and schools can take action to protect children and there have been many offers of grassroots support from parents and teachers. One parent even did a last minute direct action at her school gates, giving out flyers and template letters to others and asking them to opt out. The campaign organisers are asking people to call their MPs to protest the extraction of this data to the National Pupil Database. You can find  template letter to MPs here and a tweet from @schools_abc here.