00:00School uniform is undoubtedly a good thing because of course it sort of marks out the clothes you should wear.
00:08Of course you can tell from what a child is wearing at the school that they attend.
00:12It's about consistency which I think is good in terms of discipline and what goes on at school.
00:18The real difficulty is that schools dictate the type of clothes that you have to wear and of course with that comes the attendant cost.
00:27The idea of making uniforms more affordable has strong public support but rising prices mean many parents are worried about how much they could end up paying in the long run.
00:38Now of course if you're talking about a white shirt and dark trousers or shorts for that matter they should be fairly standard.
00:46The sort of things that you can buy almost in the supermarkets at a fairly low cost.
00:51But the difficulty is if they're dictated by school policy to come from a particular supplier they tend to become very expensive which is a real problem for some sort of parents because of course in a cost of living crisis is what we're going through.
01:03Some experts warn the policy could have unexpected side effects with local shops saying they might struggle to keep prices low if the new rules come in.
01:12What's the alternative? Yeah you go to sort of new clubs and you sort of see fashion shows and of course the sort of one pair of trainers maybe sort of you know 20 quid perhaps but of course they can easily be 200 pounds and of course then you get the sort of the aspects of envy and also more particularly kids feeling sort of they're impoverished because of course they're not wearing the sort of the white sort of gear.
01:33Meanwhile charities argue families need extra help now more than ever as the cost of kitting out each child still runs into the hundreds for some households.
01:44The fact that sort of maybe every year you've got to sort of renew the school uniform because you know and this is breaking news children tend to grow from year to year so what fits them sort of 12 months ago in sort of late August or early September when they go back to school may not be appropriate the next year.
01:59So it's a sort of big burden. The difficulty is that sort of we want kids to look smart you know should we sort of dictate that sort of schools have to do everything in a sort of very consistent manner and only sort of buy the cheapest hospitals and clothes. Well that's also problematic.
02:18For now as politicians debate the bill parents and businesses are waiting to see if the final decision really does make uniforms more affordable for everyone.
