THE LEADER of the opposition raised concerns about Denbighshire’s GCSE results and poor attendance rate – saying that around 1,650 pupils were missing from school on a daily basis.
At a Denbighshire County Council meeting today (Tuesday) councillors approved its latest annual Performance Self-Assessment, setting out the authority’s achievements, challenges, and priorities going forward.
Members debated the Performance Self-Assessment 2025/26, updating the council on performance between October 2025 to March 2026.
Key achievements in performance were listed as financial resilience, citing the council’s delivery of a balanced budget, equality objectives being met, and delivering “complex regeneration and infrastructure programmes”.
But several areas were marked “red” in the report as a concern, including education markers.
These included the attendance of pupils aged five to 15 in maintained schools – at just over 90% (90.1%), meaning 10% of children in the county weren’t attending school on a given day.
The self-assessment report also said that while “school improvements are being well managed”, GCSE results were “the lowest average of all the Welsh local authorities”.
Cllr Huw Hilditch-Roberts said school attendance was “concerning”.
“So we are on 90%, 90.1%, where the national benchmark average is about 95%,” he said.
“But what is worrying for me, when you look at it, that’s almost 1,650 pupils in Denbighshire per week that are not attending school, and that is a concern for me, and I think we need to look at exactly what the plan is around that going forward because some of our schools do reach the benchmark nationally.”
He added: “But in some of our most deprived areas, we are not reaching that, and then also you talk about some of the lower GCSE results in certain areas in the report, and so I think there are concerns, and I think they are linked, and I think that is a bit of a red flag, especially that number. Nearly 10% of our pupils not in school is quite worrying.”
But the council’s Head of Corporate Support Service, Helen Vaughan-Evans, said the figures were “an improving trend from last year” but “still below benchmark”.
She added a whole service plan had been “designed around improving attendance”.
The report acknowledged “educational inequalities”, citing “the difference in some key educational indicators” had “widened again” with “a persistent gap between disadvantaged pupils and their peers”.
The reasons given for this were environmental, socio-economic, and systemic factors.
Other key challenges referred to in the report included financial sustainability, climate goals, and public perception.
Councillors also raised concerns after an anonymous council staff survey saw just a 53% turnout, prompting discussions on how incentives could boost the number of responses in future.
Cllr Alan James proposed councillors noted and backed the report, this was seconded by Cllr Mark Young, and the report was voted through.
