Despite figures for exclusions which show all Weymouth secondary schools performing badly the county’s education cabinet member says the situation has been improving.

Children and education portfolio holder Cllr Andrew Parry says permanent exclusions have dropped by two thirds since 2018-19 in the area, although suspensions have been increasing.

He told Weymouth councillor Clare Sutton that ‘extra resources’ had been put into the Chesil Locality Partnership when it was set up in recognition of the problems in the area.

Cllr Sutton had asked what Dorset Council was doing to tackle the disparity between Weymouth and Portland where all four secondary schools were rated badly for exclusions, compared to the rest of the county. One of the schools had figures five times the national average.

“Whilst I completely understand that exclusions are sometimes necessary for the benefit of other pupils and the school as a whole, and that Dorset Council has limited influence in relation to Academy schools, there is clearly a pattern here.

“For all the talk of levelling up I think we’re all aware that social mobility scores for Weymouth and Portland are among the very worst in the country,” she said.

Cllr Parry said that a range of actions were being taken to tackle the problem of excluded pupils and those who might be at risk of exclusion with various multi-agency meetings taking place monthly and, in some cases, weekly.

He said that in August only 3 per cent of Dorset pupils were missing education, none from the primary school sector, a ten per cent improvement on the previous year; while in the 21-22 year there had been just 31 permanent school exclusions which he said was a “significant improvement.”