Education Secretary Damian Hinds has responded to calls for tighter regulation of children being schooled at home and announced plans for parents to register them with the local authority.
The estimated 60,000 home-schooled children in England and Wales include an unknown number within the Charedi community of Stamford Hill.
But Charedi activists have warned home schooling could increase if schools are forced to teach certain subjects under the government new relationships and sex education curriculum.
Mr Hinds said the term “home education” includes “children who are not getting an education at all, or being educated in illegal schools where they are vulnerable to dangerous influences”.
He added: “That’s why this register of children not in school is so important – not to crack down on those dedicated parents doing an admirable job of educating their children in their own homes, but to prevent vulnerable young people from vanishing under the radar.”
Children’s Commissioner Anne Longfield, who has urging registration, welcomed the plans, as did Ofsted chief inspector Amanda Spielman.
Mrs Spielman said the register would make it easier to detect children “not attending a registered school, many of whom may not be receiving a high quality education or being kept safe”.
Hundreds of Stamford Hill boys are taught in unregistered yeshivot, which argue they are not schools and therefore are currently not obliged to register with the Department for Education.
A Board of Deputies spokesperson said it supported "high safeguarding and academic standards for all children, wherever they are being educated. The proposed legislation, though, may be seen by some, particularly in the Charedi community, as an encroachment on the rights of parents and religious communities to educate their children in the environment of their choosing – especially where suitable provisions are not in place in the state sector."
The Board would respond to the government's consultation after speaking to "community stakeholders".
