A Banbury mother jailed twice for allowing her daughter to play truant said she would go to school with her to ensure it did not happen again.

Patricia Amos, 45, of Thornbury Rise, was speaking shortly after being released after serving half her 28-day prison sentence, imposed last month.

She denounced her sentence as "hypocritical", because her daughter Jacqueline, 13, was suspended from school a day after she was jailed and had been unable to attend lessons while she was in prison.

Amos said she was prepared to take any necessary steps to avoid a further stretch behind bars.

"I couldn't handle that again. No way," she said. "It's not very nice."

Amos was the first parent in England to be jailed for permitting a child to play truant.

Following her first jail term in 2002, she said the experience had taught her a lesson and would not allow it to happen again. Following that sentence, her daughter was given an attendence card which had to be signed by a teacher every day. But Amos said the school did not contact her when Jacqueline started playing truant again.

"She's a teenager. I can't pick her up and put her over my shoulder, but I gave her the benefit of the doubt. She had her school uniform on, her school bag and her school books."