School refusing to share CAMHS referral

[CAMHShelp]

Name changed as quite outing
School have made a referral to CAMHS for DC2. I have asked for a copy of this referral and school are refusing saying it’s confidential, from one professional to another, and need it to remain confidential in order to be completely honest but “reassure me that there is nothing controversial on there”.
My understanding is that unless it’s a safeguarding issue then they cannot withhold such information. I also do not believe it’s in DC best interests for school not to be transparent with parents when they suspect SEN etc.
What are other peoples experiences/views and where do I go from here? Do I risk further damaging my relationship with school and demand to see it (YANBU) or do I accept this lack of transparency is the protocol and not make a fuss? (YABU)

Just to answer a few questions. Yes I know what the referral was for I.e the issue but not the details. I have spoke to DC about whether they are happy for me to see referral and they clearly couldn’t care less either way. CAMHS are now onboard, no wait time as such, albeit in a triage capacity will have to wait a few months for psych to pick it up but they estimated 6 months, they didn’t say years but let’s see. No nothing to do with transgender issues or anything like that, I can’t see my OP but I think I did mention it was SEN related.
I have requested this information and/or a meeting to discuss why not three times to this person, following the comments on here I have emailed the head to sort out otherwise I think it’ll be governors or ICO to contact. Perhaps there is stuff in there about me but I can’t think what as I’m just your average parent but if they do think there’s something I’m doing wrong then I’d like their feedback on that likewise if I thought they were doing something wrong I’d get in touch. I don’t like all this ‘confidential’ and ‘one professional to another’ nonsense.

I'm a retired SEN teacher (specialist school). We always shared referrals with parents, but with a health warning. As a school, as teachers, we celebrated success, and took a very positive attitude to the children. So although we were realistic at parents' evenings, we were also very warm and celebrated the small things and emphasised progress.

For any of those parents to see a bald referral that focused on the problems and on the negative, could be really upsetting and demoralising. We had to explain to them that the people we needed to help them and their child, weren't interested in the achievements. That they would be a distraction which might mean they'd not prioritise them for support. So we had to make sure we included every difficulty, every problem.

Consequently we never posted or emailed those reports to them. We always brought the parents in, and read the report to them first, explaining why we'd said what we'd said, and reminding them about the good stuff.

They have to share it ask under GDPR -write a formal email -saying I asked on the 5th September 2021 for the CAMHS referral and you have 40 days from this request to comply -I would strongly ask you to forward it immediately.

I think it depends on the child's age, and child may not wish the referral to be shared with you, even if they're saying they don't mind either way

I filled in my child's referral with the school senco. We literally sat in front of the computer together typing in the answers. The referral was made at my request.

The school need to work with you on this. No one knows your child as well as you do so your input is absolutely vital. How on earth do the school think they can answer non educational questions about your child. They don't know how they behave at home and probably haven't noticed even half of what you have.

Make a formal request in writing for a copy of their referral. You need to know what they've put on it.

If your referral is accepted by CAMHs (and that's the next hurdle because they don't even accept all referrals) it will be you meeting with CAMHs and discussing your child. The school won't be there or even be copied in on any notes. It's a medical matter from that point on and confidential.

Thanks I just wasn't sure if they had some sort of right to withhold the information but it seems they don’t.

My DS has just received an ADHD & ASD diagnosis, we received a separate report for both of them and they included the report from the schools SENDCO in the report I received so assume it’s therefore not considered confidential between school and CAHMs

Wouldn't the gp have a copy of the referral from the school to camhs maybe ring them up and maybe try speaking to camhs and head teacher

How old is your DC? Once they reach a certain age then they have the legal right for their information not to be shared without their consent, in which case the school would need their permission to share with you. I'm not saying that your child is hiding anything from you, just that the processes can be different at different ages.

Age is vital here. We can't answer your question without knowing your child's age or whether they have mental capacity.

@Goawayangryman

Age is vital here. We can't answer your question without knowing your child's age or whether they have mental capacity.

Good point. My earlier post about referrals that I made, was based on working with primary aged children

It might just be someone having doubts about whether they've got a right to share the referral - many professionals are risk averse about data breaches and have had little training in GDPR. Along with that, you're only allowed to share documentation from your own agency, which confuses people when they are asked to share information that includes more than one agency. Eg school know they can share a school report, CAMHS know they can share a CAMHS report, school professional completing a CAMHS document might be unsure where the ownership of that document lies, and that it's not a standard part of your childs school record - hence the reference to it being correspondence between professionals. And as a PP said above, the referral is likely to be negatively focused/worst day examples (in order to get a service) which isn't written with a parent in mind, and the referrer might be worried about how that'll be perceived by the parent.
I'd encourage you to pursue seeing it if you want to, but please don't assume it's being purposeful ly hidden from you as its really common to be a lack of understanding about what can be shared. And that's before we get into the issues of teens, capacity and consent and their right to privacy!

UPDATE I now have the referral, I don’t now trust the school not to have changed it but I’m just going to have to let that one go and focus on CAMHS and getting DC the right support.