The percentage of secondary school pupils reporting they are bullied each month has dropped - but parents say it is on the rise - the Department for Education’s annual omnibus survey has found.

The proportion of pupils who reported in the survey that they were bullied at school at least once a month was 20 per cent, down from the 33 per cent recorded in the survey during the winter of 2016-17.

But among parents, 16 per cent said their child had been a victim of bullying, up from 9 per cent in the earlier survey. Among college students, 12 per cent said they had been bullied.

Overall, 9 per cent of school pupils and 14 per cent of college students said another pupil or student had “said something sexist or sexual” to them at least once a month in the last year, while 2 per cent of school pupils and 1 per cent of college students complained of having been touched inappropriately and without permission at least once a month.

Both pupils and parents thought schools were likely to take action over inappropriate touching, but not over sexist or sexual remarks.

The vast majority of pupils, students and parents had never heard of the government’s website “educate against hate”, which seeks to give advice on protecting children from extremism and radicalisation.

These findings came from the fourth “wave” of the survey which began in the summer of 2016.

The survey took place from November 2017 to January 2018, and was answered by 2,590 paired parent/carer and school pupil respondents, with a 22 per response rate, while among paired parents and college students there were 206 answers - a 10 per cent response rate.