Criminalise & legally require schools to tackle bullying in & out of school

We urge the Government to make repeated bullying over the age of 10 a specific criminal offence, and to make it a legal requirement for schools to act on all forms of bullying, inside and out of school, and mandate mental health reviews after bullying-related self-harm.

Too many children are bullied in and out of school. We ask the Government for real consequences, urgent mental health intervention, and legal protection.

The Government is clear that all forms of bullying are unacceptable and recognises that bullying can have a devastating and long-lasting effect on individuals’ mental health. Tackling and preventing bullying in schools is essential to ensure that all schools are supportive environments within which pupils feel they belong and are able to achieve and thrive. The death of Willow Lee is a stark and tragic reminder of the potential consequences of bullying and of the need for schools to make both preventing and tackling bullying a priority, and to work with specialists to ensure that the right mental health support is provided at the right time.

The legal framework for this already exists and the Government is taking steps to improve both prevention and support. Schools are already legally required to have a behaviour policy. This should set out the policies and processes in place to prevent and deal with violence, bullying or harassment by pupils and be clear about the standards of behaviour expected in school or outside of school and the consequences or sanctions for such behaviour, which include reporting incidents to the police or taking legal action.

The Department for Education (the Department) provides schools with support to tackle bullying with its guidance Preventing and tackling bullying. The guidance is clear that schools should make appropriate provision for a bullied child's social, emotional and mental health needs. The guidance can be found here: Preventing and tackling bullying (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1069688/Preventing_and_tackling_bullying_advice.pdf)

In terms of criminal offences, while bullying in itself is not a specific criminal offence in the UK, a number types of harassing or threatening behaviour – or communications – can be a criminal offence, for example under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, the Malicious Communications Act 1988, the Communications Act 2003, and the Public Order Act 1986. This means that there is a route to treat many specific instances as a criminal offence and Government guidance is clear that if school staff feel that an offence might have been committed, they should seek assistance from the police.

It is also vitally important that children and young people get early and appropriate support for mental health issues, including those that might be related to bullying. In particular, the Government is committed to supporting children and young people and others who have self-harmed or are at risk of self-harming through the targeted actions in the Suicide Prevention Strategy for England. These actions focus efforts on prevention and the provision of consistent high-quality care and support for self-harm. The Government continues to fund the Multicentre Study of Self-harm, whose work is vital in informing the development of policy, and of clinical practice across sectors.

More widely, the Government is providing access to specialist mental health professionals in every school by expanding Mental Health Support Teams (MHSTs), so every child and young person has access to early support to address problems before they escalate. Almost a million more young people will get access to MHSTs this year. One of the core functions of MHSTs is to give timely advice to school staff and liaise with external specialist services to help children and young people to get the right support. They also provide evidence-based interventions for early mental health issues.

The Department monitors young people’s perceptions of bullying through the annual National Behaviour Survey report, to develop our understanding of bullying prevalence and trends. The latest version (2023/24) is available here: National Behaviour Survey (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/68a5ec7b8e2cb87576994d6f/National_behaviour_survey_AY_2023_2024_August_2025.pdf)

The Department is strongly committed to providing continued support for schools to tackle bullying and is procuring an expert- and evidence-led review into best practice on preventing and tackling bullying, as well as promoting good behaviour and reducing preventable exclusions. This will inform the creation of a practical resource for schools, to be tested in a range of schools before being rolled out nationally. This approach has been informed by recent engagement with a range of stakeholders, including teachers, parents, academics, charities and young people, to understand more about the issues around bullying.

The learning from the best practice review will inform the support to be shared across new Regional Improvement for Standards and Excellence (RISE) Attendance and Behaviour Hubs, which are being established across regions in England to focus on supporting senior leaders to develop safe, supportive school cultures.

Department for Education