School not letting my child from the school

[Kutika]

I have read numerous discussions where people mention that schools cannot legally prevent a child from leaving, yet I find myself in this exact situation. The school is refusing to allow my child to leave, despite my clear instructions. I've sent an email, filed a complaint with the trust, and even contacted the police, but to my surprise, none of these actions have resolved the issue. I was told by the head teacher that the law does not apply to them. Any ideas on who to contact?

Schools aren't responsible for students once they have left the school grounds out of school hours.

They can make a judgement on whether or not to call SS, that's it. If they don't call SS then they should not be detaining a child when their parent has given permission for them to leave and its outside school hours. They definitely should not be charging the parents for detaining the child.

This exactly sums up the school’s options. It’s incredibly frustrating that this thread is still going round and round in circles with people who don’t understand schools’ safeguarding powers or duties arguing the opposite.

The school are acting unlawfully. Not one person has managed to come up with any legal basis for the school to detain in this scenario. Lots of us have pointed to statutory guidance that makes it clear this is not lawful and still two thirds of people are saying the OP is in the wrong.

It’s also shit safeguarding. Having a policy that says “children can walk home at X age” is a problem because it suggests that there is a right time for everyone, rather than encouraging parents and staff to assess each child’s individual needs. That goes against NSPCC guidance. I’ve reported to social services when a child of 13 wasn’t being collected from school and parents wanted her to make her own way home, because we had evidence that her learning needs meant she was putting herself in danger with strangers. Social services agreed with us. That’s what good safeguarding is. If they think the OP’s judgement call is putting her DD in danger, then it is pretty shocking that haven’t already reported to social services that the child is arriving to school unaccompanied.

Or dependent on the journey.

My 12 year old’s secondary would be perfectly reasonable calling social services if she wasn’t collected from school.

Your first sentence says ‘they haven’t broken any laws’.

Well they have. Pretty simple that really.

"Not one person has managed to come up with any legal basis for the school to detain in this scenario."

There plenty of reasons. The obvious one is their legal duty of care towards the child. Most posters just disagree with the school's assesment based on the schools age.

Probably why the police disagreed with the OP /your legal assessment of the situation

It isn't even at "x age" is it, that might be more reasonable. Some children in year 5 will already by 10, I think the OP said her child will be 10 next month, in April some children in year 5 will be months off their 10th birthday. Obviously it will vary by school and by year but saying some year 5s aren't ready to walk home at 10 and some are at 9 year 8 months makes no sense unless they are actually accessing each child not just a blanket "they will be ready in April."

Uh huh, I know. The child hadn’t left the school grounds. HTH.

This! I have worked in schools too. One of the parents just needs to collect their child from school until the school deems them old enough to walk home themselves. This child has only just started in year 5 and is 9. The school has a safeguarding duty. The school may also be aware of other details of family circumstances.

I’ve reported to social services when a child of 13 wasn’t being collected from school and parents wanted her to make her own way home, because we had evidence that her learning needs meant she was putting herself in danger with strangers. Social services agreed with us. That’s what good safeguarding is. If they think the OP’s judgement call is putting her DD in danger, then it is pretty shocking that haven’t already reported to social services that the child is arriving to school unaccompanied.

That's absolutely right @Takoneko. And as I posted previously once SS are involved, they will ask what specific safeguarding concerns the school has with regard to this particular child and this particular journey. An HT muttering in vague general terms about 'safeguarding issues' is going to be asked what precisely they are in this instance (at least, in my professional experience that is what happens).

Effectively in this instance there is a stand-off. The two parties disagree. But the default position is to defer to what the parents want, not what the school wants, and while I agree with @Walkden that SS are unlikely to actually 'do' anything, they will advise the school that it should abide by the parents' wishes, which have been expressed clearly and in writing.

OP you should advise your DC that she has your permission to leave school at the end of the school day and walk home. The school can't actually prevent this happening, unless they are going to take physical action. They would be extremely ill-advised to do so.

They are not on the school premises once they are walking home though so the school will not be responsible for anything that happens. HTH.

Yes the school has a safeguarding duty.

That duty is to report concerns. They haven't done that.

If the school has additional concerns they definitely need to report them. They haven't.

SS may have concerns that the school don't know about. That's the other reason the school needs to report. That is the basis of safeguarding. But they haven't.

Why have they ignored the principles of safeguarding?

This is a ludicrous line of argument and you could apply it equally to the theoretical toddler too. Once they leave the premises it’s all good, right?

The school has responsibility for the children on its premises including whether they feel it is safe to let them leave. Indeed that’s pretty high up the list of responsibilities.

Given the fact that the school has not correctly followed procedure with regard to safeguarding, and that they have not contacted SS as threatened (despite @Kutika saying she would welcome their involvement), I think it is reasonable to infer that the HT cannot evidence a specific issue in this specific instance. They're probably just pissed off that OP is unwilling to bow to the school's policy.

@Sadlynotright it's not up to the school to decide when a child is old enough to walk home, it's up to the parents! If a school deems there to be a safeguarding risk involved in that decision, they have to contact the relevant authorities; making the decision themselves is a massive over-step. People who work/worked in schools really ought to know this.

This! We have no idea what the family situation is or what the school have done as regards safeguarding so I’m out! People who work in schools have extensive training on safeguarding.

It's not the same thing because no parent would give permission for a toddler to leave the premises and if they did the school should phone social services and follow their advice as that parent is negligent. If a 9 year old leaves with parental permission then anything that happened would be the parents responsibility if anyones as it is normal for 9 year olds to walk home by themselves.

And you were stepping away 🤣🤣🤣

This thread does feel like the laymen are trying to teach the experts their job 🤦

I know. I stepped away and then couldn’t believe it when I saw it was still going around in the same circle a day and a half later. It’s nuts.

And as I keep saying, there are then grey areas after that, including the age group under discussion, where a parent’s view may clash with the school’s.

Once we’re in those grey areas, the school cannot just shrug and say it’s not their problem once the unaccompanied child has wandered out onto the pavement. They have to follow their own processes. So far the OP has not said anything to indicate that this situation has occurred on more than that one day, unless I’ve misread. So the school looked after the child in ASC that day and the parent emailed to complain, and called the police, for reasons.

I'm not sure what you mean by "grey area" . There are ages where no child would be safe to leave but there is no age where they all are. Parents are in the best position to decide whether it's safe for their child to leave school. 9 year olds walk home everywhere but if a child's not able to do that for some specific reason (e.g. special needs) and the school needs to take their concerns to the parent and if they "clash" ,social services.

Do you have children or knowledge of the law in this area?

Can I ask how familiar you are with the contents of KCSIE and Working Together to Safeguard Children? For example, are you familiar on the guidance for agencies that believe a child is in immediate danger on p85 of WTtSC? Even in such cases, schools and even social services have quite limited power without a court order.

This is not the grey area you think it is. Schools have a duty to report parenting they feel is not appropriately safeguarding the child, but no power to override it. When we reported that a student with SEND was being put at risk by being allowed by her mum to travel to and from school alone, social services agreed with us but it still took over a month to resolve. We weren’t allowed to just keep her in school and insist the mum came to get her. That could have created additional risk by resulting in us having to let her go home alone later in the day when it was dark if her mum had still refused to come.

You might think that we should be allowed to do that, but we are not.

Amazingly so do lots of other people… We do know that the school has not contacted SS (or if they have, SS have clearly declined to get involved so it's a non-issue).

It's so weird that people think the default position is that the school is right when it's quite clear that in fact it is deemed to be the parents who are right unless the school can demonstrate clear and specific reasons otherwise.

As I said upthread, it’s obvious that a toddler shouldn’t be allowed go alone and also obvious that other than in specific circumstances, a 16-year-old should. Somewhere in between there are going to be ages where a school thinks one thing and at least one parent disagrees. Don’t you think? That’s my grey area.

I have two kids who went to a school where nine year-olds could walk home alone after Easter but not at this time of year. I was also a school governor for several years and have other safeguarding training through kids’ sports. But I don’t even need that here, it’s just logic/ common sense. There’s a niggling argument between a school and a parent at an age where there’s a genuine debate to be had. Like the one here.

Again, what has happened so far appears to be on one single day. The school acted sensibly enough on that one day. Maybe the OP will be back to tell tales of their subsequent victory at some point.

If you believe that the school notifies you each time there is a safeguarding concern you are sadly mistaken. There are about 400,000 children who are in need of safeguarding support right now - plus approx 50-51000 children on child protection plans. In some counties in the UK they are doing 60 plus strategy meetings a week (which include multiple children). Before you ask the stats are fairly easy to find on line!

Safeguarding risks can start as low level and escalate quickly (before comms can be sent!) these are the ones where extra vigilance maybe needed. If you believe safeguarding risks stay the same day in and day out then you have no idea!!

I don’t know if this school has applied these rules because of safeguarding we are all speculating here - but it’s a possibility.

I am not going to respond to you anymore as you clearly cannot listen to anyone else apart from yourself, you have no concept of a balanced view and clearly have no idea what some of the kids that go to school go through each and every day at home!!!