Julia Bradbury has said if families can’t afford to go away with their kids during school holidays, they should just take them out of school in term time.
The former ‘Countryfile’ presenter, who is mum to Zephyr, five, and one-year-old twins Zena and Xanthe, also commented on the amount of time children are kept indoors, saying they spend less time outside every day than prisoners do.
She said if parents have the chance to take their kids on an “adventure”, they should homeschool them because it will be “educational and eye-opening”.
“We as parents are penalised for taking our children away during holiday periods because travel companies jack up prices so ludicrously,” she told the Mail on Sunday.
“It is completely unfair. It’s a child tax - it’s cynical and the [travel] industry needs to stop being so evil.”
Bradbury said she would support any family who wanted to take their kids out of school to go on holiday.
Advising parents, she added: “If there is a family that cannot afford to go away because prices are four times what they would be in term time, then if I was in their position I would go to my headmaster or headmistress and say: ‘I don’t have any other choice, so give me their homework’.”
The Supreme Court is currently due to rule on the term-time holiday ban after a father, who was fined for taking his daughter to Disneyland, won a landmark High Court ruling against the £120 fee.
Two judges declared that Jon Platt, from the Isle of Wight, was not acting “unlawfully” because his daughter had a good attendance record for the rest of the year.
Isle of Wight Council, the local education authority that took Platt to court, asked five Supreme Court justices to overturn the High Court judgment.
The Supreme Court justices will consider whether or not Platt committed an offence by failing to ensure his daughter “attended school regularly”, as required by the 1996 Education Act.
The outcome of the ruling is yet to be announced.