Panorama tonight

[LunaTheCat]

Watching this tonight re Wirral school… there are no words, just appalling.

Because dedicated teachers would campaign for better facilities, proper curriculum. And the owner's mission was just to make as much money as he could. So he hired thugs who didn't care.

Statement on the Life school website:

LIFE Wirral - Statement
A Life spokesperson said: “The BBC has acted in a highly irresponsible manner putting the interests of a television programme ahead of the interests of vulnerable children.

“An undercover investigator failed in her basic safeguarding duties to report significant concerns and had she have done so on day one there would be no television programme and nearly twenty at-risk children would still have a safe environment in which they can learn and develop as young adults.

“In correspondence from the BBC they stated they had uncovered ‘significant safeguarding issues’, if they were significant (as a responsible school we absolutely agree they were), why did they not report them and put a stop to it there and then? They chose not to because they had other priorities and the children’s welfare was not their primary concern. As a team of highly respected education specialists we see no justification whatsoever allowing such incidents to continue;
the safeguarding of the children should have come first rather than a television show. It cannot be stressed enough, had these incidents been reported immediately the members of staff would have been instantly suspended; something the reporter knew too well.

“Indeed, shocking evidence has also revealed that not only did the investigator ignore clear advice to report safeguarding issues she went one step further and falsified official reports in order to claim that situations were handled well on theschool’s safeguarding system which would deceive the safeguarding lead and ultimately allow the television programme to proceed.

“Life School was a very successful Ofsted rated place of learning, shortlisted by the Times Educational Supplement as Inclusive School of the Year 2023 but regardless of how respected the school was it does not condone the behaviour revealed by the programme and five members of staff have been suspended and will face disciplinary action. This action cannot take place because the BBC has withheld evidence from the school despite asking for it to be handed over on several occasions.

“The school immediately launched an investigation, reported the broadcaster to the police and will be taking all necessary legal steps against the BBC.”

This is staggering. How dare they blame the whistleblower? What about the many staff that would have been in school on those days that the whistleblower saw that kids were being abused. This wasn’t a one off event. It wasn’t a bad apple or lone wolf. It is a systemic culture of child abuse in that awful institution, all expensively funded by the taxpayer.

Why isn’t there a public inquiry into abuse at schools? Why isn’t there a enquiry into why government funding has forced it so that LAs want to or have to provide care for these vulnerable kids, via schools which are allowed to be run by basically anyone off the street who wants to set one up?
Where is the government anger about this? I just see a load of adults being allowed to cover their own arses professionally at children’s expense.

These kids are uniquely vulnerable and if you have a kid with SEND you will know how terrifying the thought of this kind of treatment of vulnerable children is.

That's a hell of a statement. If I recall the reason panorama got involved was because previous whistleblowing had gone nowhere.

If the whistleblower had reported on day 1, the likelihood is that the one or two people she saw misbehaving on day 1 would be sacrificed leaving the others to carry on. It's extraordinary that that doesn't concern them. Also that they're not bothered that the head saw abuse going on and ignored it.

The Head leaves me cold. She must have been responsible for the hired thugs.

This sort of shitty treatment of children with SEND goes on more than you'd realise, and I'd say it goes on in mainstream schools as much (if not more than) special.

I have 2 children with SEND and have experience of mainstream primary and secondary, a LEA special and independent special.

I removed my autistic 3 yo from a mainstream primary school nursery class because their TAs yelled at and manhandled the children unnecessarily. There were witnesses and cctv, but they still thought they'd done nothing wrong.

My elder child had some awful things said to her by TAs in mainstream secondary, and heard TAs gossiping about a girl with down syndrome whilst this girl and other children were in the room and could hear! Again I got absolutely nowhere raising concerns.

In fact the statement from the Wirral Life school doesnt surprise me, it is exactly like the gaslighting responses i got from both mainstream schools that i raised concerns to.

The independent specialist school did employ unqualified teachers which isnt great and i wasnt so happy about, but they were patient and kind to the children- my eldest definitely would have reported anything untoward! And I have had no problems with the LEA special school.

The head is delusional. Five members of staff in a school in the size of a house is a big proportion of staff even if they have more than one adult per class. Also no other adult who witnessed it followed kcsie advice and whistle blew? That wasn't reported to MASH? The HT is talking like a lay person who knows nothing about safeguarding.

Jimmy Saville did lots for charity, your rated Ofsted Good. It's called a farce. A front. Abusers groom. Does there grooming actions outweigh the harm? Let's see.

These arrogant people can just seet a new business no doubt.

Rot always comes from the SMTs attitude. Always

It's shocking how quickly the school want to shift the blame and try to avoid owning up to their own failings to protect vulnerable children.
If the reporter hadn't filmed this it would still be going on today. One member of staff admitted they falsify accident reports, it's clear their procedures don't work.
They have a Head who is ineffective at managing weak staff. A senior leadership team made up of bullies. An owner with no expertise running it as a business.
Meanwhile these children are suffering physical, verbal and emotional abuse.

Quite extraordinary that there is nothing in the Life statement about why they didn't act on previous whistleblowing disclosures, and how come no other member of staff noticed what these five people were doing. It's also really childish reporting the BBC to the police, that is going to get them precisely nowhere. The whole thing reeks of them being angry that they had to close that school and that their other schools will presumably be in danger. With these standards of supervision, I must say that if my child was in a Life school I would be taking steps today to get them out.

Most appalling abuse of power. They are not qualified teachers as they can employ anyone in private education. I'm a former teacher on the Wirral. I am horrified at what I saw. It goes against every code of teacher conduct. They should never be near a school again.

Putting aside the staff issues for a moment, as a layperson not involved in education in any way, I was staggered at the costs involved. £150k a year for one child to be taken to a leisure facility once a week? You've got to be kidding me. How did we get here? And we wonder where our taxes are going.

Surely it's abuse?
Can these people be charged?

It’s also difficult as a teacher to raise concerns. These outfits use established systems when it suits. Ie threats to report to teaching regulatory bodies. Find a constant churn of staff. People leave rather than be witness to poor practice.

The money being paid by local authorities is staggering. They say it works out for them. Ie provisions claim to have specialist staff such as SPAD, OT, Psych etc. but many will be unqualified working under supervision with little experience or positions are hard to fill for ethical reasons.

It’s a ramp all of it. And local authorities are often complicit. It’s easier to palm off rather than provide decent provision in their areas.

And no one really cares about these children.

There was a similar story recently - I don’t think any were charged. And still have licence to teach. Nothing changed.

I would much rather hear about what the parties will do about this post GE than anything else either of them are proposing for education.

https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/all-about/wirral

The Liverpool Echo are picking up various stories on the 'school'.

Merseyside Police are investigating but this them time because they will only just have been made aware of this and the investigation will be quite complex.
I vaguely know of the CEO and this is absolutely no surprise to me whatsoever. He thought he was going to become a billionaire from SEN education. Here’s hoping he sees the inside of a prison cell.

We refused a placement in an independent SEMH school where a teacher was prosecuted for assault on children. LEA accepted this reason (and a child had committed suicide with signs of self harm missed) but still pays for children to go there.

that is a shocking conflict of interest.

In my experience Local Authorities are in no way complicit. Believe it or not, Local Authorities are not the evil bad guys SEN parents like to think they are. They are just very underfunded.

In no way do they ‘palm off’ children to independent schools, 90% of the time it is parents who are attracted by the glossy brochures and promises of schools like these and take local authorities to tribunal for a place. A parent on the programme said as much, saying she had fought for 18 months for a place at the Wirral school for her child.

Local authorities are then bled dry of tax payers money by these people who are greedy at best and criminal at worst. Money that should be going into local schools. And of course without this funding, more parents fight for the independent option…

LAs are not the heroes either.

We are all aware of the funding issues, but would have to point out that LA s are charged with ensuring that these glossy schools are what they say they are. Due diligence?

When issues are raised what are the LAs doing? Do they investigate in their MASH hubs or do they sweep concerns under the carpet. Perhaps allowing some schools to investigate themselves.

I wouldn’t entirely blame LAs - Ofsted, SS & CCQ are all complicit.

But please don’t blame parents for wanting the best for their children.

@Viscoelasticity 90% of the time it is parents who are attracted by the glossy brochures and promises of schools like these and take local authorities to tribunal for a place. A parent on the programme said as much, saying she had fought for 18 months for a place at the Wirral school for her child.

It's not the shiny brochures. It's the fact that NOWHERE ELSE WILL BLOODY TAKE YOUR CHILD.
DS is currently in an independent SEMH school which frankly has crap brochures but the grounds/outdoor space/some of the classrooms are lovely, it has animals which he loves. The other schools we saw were either incredibly scary (for us, as adults) or had previous safeguarding red flags.
But we saw two lovely mainstream schools with specialist bases and we would have vastly preferred him to go to them - he really opened up at one mainstream open day, was really attracted to the facilities and actually managed to talk to some of the older children - but they wouldn't take him. There aren't any SEMH maintained schools in our area except the PRU so off to independent it was.
The schools with bases were full and the LEA would be unable to persuade them to double or triple their provision (we'd need at least 5x the provision in our area of course to meet need!) partly because other parents don't want bases. So the LEA had no choice but to pay for independent.

Exactly this!
I was in an independent school for pupils with ASD not long ago. They had all been excluded from maintained schools, including Special schools.
This chain of independent schools are meeting a need that isn't met by the state sector. They will take the pupils that nobody else wants.
These kids are travelling for hours by taxi to school. The parents weren't happy, the children weren't happy.
There was no glossy brochure!!!