Greenwich/Rotherham Judgements - where to find them online?

[Flabbergastric]

School admissions related texts often refer to these two judgements:

1. Greenwich Judgement (R v Greenwich London Borough Council, ex parte John Ball Primary School (1989) 88 LGR 589 [1990] Fam Law 469) which held that pupils should not be discriminated against in relation to admission to the school simply because they reside outside the local authority area in which the school is situated.

1. Rotherham Judgement 1997 which said that catchment areas that coincided with borough boundaries are allowed.

I've read third party descriptions of these online, but I'd like to read the judgements themselves. Does anyone know where I might find the full text online?

children should not be discriminated against in relation to school admissions simply because they reside outside the local authority area in which the school is situated

Persian, it is the word "simply" that complicates it. It implies that they can be discriminated against IF they reside outside the local authority area in which the school is situated AND something else.

My current understanding of the Rotherham Judgement (from the little I've managed to gather here on Mumsnet and elsewhere online) is that if the "something else" is a historically defined school catchment area, or a Diocesan boundary, which happens to coincide with the borough boundary, then all is fine.

But what if a new school (necessarily an academy, with no formal LA interest) were to define a new catchment area coinciding with the borough boundary, or part of the borough boundary? That is less clear to me.

I have access through a university to a law library and Lexis. Unfortunately, at the time both judgments were given the system was in transition from old-style commercial law reporting to the modern practice of releasing everything for free through the internet. I cannot find either case free on the internet. Both were paper published in the Local Government Reports and the Family Law Reports. Lexis only has a Times report of John Ball but does have a scan of the LGR version of Rotherham. Unfortunately, Lexis restrictions mean I can't download that to pass on, but when I am next at the university if I have time and remember I may wander over to the library and have a look.

Flabbergastric

If you go to any large library most of them will have access to LexisNexis or Westlaw as part of their subscription so they should be able to help you. Or any university with a law library. The problem as identified above is that these are older judgments. All new judgments are available online.

The R v Greenwich London Borough Council, ex parte John Ball Primary School is also reported in the following papers:

Times, December 27, 1989; Independent, December 22, 1989; Daily Telegraph, January 26, 1990

but this will be a short form newspaper report not the whole transcript.

The full citation for the Rotherham case is:
R. v Rotherham MBC Ex p. LT
Court of Appeal (Civil Division)
04 November 1999
Reported: [2000] B.L.G.R. 338; [2000] Ed. C.R. 39; [2000] E.L.R. 76; Times, December 3, 1999

I can't post the whole of the judgment but the key quotation from the Rotherham case is the following bit which summarizes the reasons for the decision from the Judgment of Stuart-Smith J:

In my judgment it is difficult to see that the fact that the child had a place at another school rather than living outside the catchment area can be of any real significance since all local education authorities are bound to find places for those people in their areas who are not accommodated elsewhere. Those in Wiltshire, but outwith the catchment areas of St Lawrence, will have guaranteed places in the same way as those in neighbouring local education authorities. As Mr Justice Popplewell said at page 225: [1996] ELR 220

“The policy of Wiltshire is quite clear. Those within and those outside the county will be treated in the same way. Those who live within the catchment area will be treated differently from those outside the catchment area, but this is not an attack on the validity of the catchment area.”

It is always a great misfortune if children, for whatever reason, cannot go to the school of their parents' choice. Unfortunately, that is one of the inevitable consequences where a school is oversubscribed. It is often the case that the better the school, the more its reputation, the more oversubscribed it is. The education authority must have a sensible system for admissions in the case of oversubscription. Proximity and hence catchment areas may well be the primary consideration. The catchment area cannot itself be criticised. It does not contravene the Act just because it coincides to some extent with the local education boundary.

Although therefore I have sympathy with the Ts, I can find no basis for holding that the decision is unlawful. I would dismiss this appeal.

*Stuart-Smith LJ - Lord Justice not Mr Justice, it's a Court of Appeal decision

But what if a new school (necessarily an academy, with no formal LA interest) were to define a new catchment area coinciding with the borough boundary, or part of the borough boundary? That is less clear to me
Actually the judgments are not as relevant now as they have been incorporated into the codified in the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 and School Admissions Code.

Have you looked at these??

www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/389388/School_Admissions_Code_2014_-_19_Dec.pdf

Sorry forgot the link a minute ago.

This maybe helpful but is from 2004 and law changes a lot!:

www.39essex.co.uk/docs/articles/Education_and_Admissions_KS_0404.pdf

Have you looked at these??

Yes, or at least I'm very familiar with the Admissions code, which is referenced by the SSFA as the source of admissions guidance, and I've just skim-read the SSFA and can't see anything additional in there that may be relevant.

The current (2014) Admissions Code just says .....

"1.14 Catchment areas must be designed so that they are reasonable and clearly defined*. Catchment areas do not prevent parents who live outside the catchment of a particular school from expressing a preference for the school.

*R v Greenwich London Borough Council, ex parte John Ball Primary School (1989) 88 LGR 589 [1990] Fam Law 469 held that pupils should not be discriminated against in relation to admission to the school simply because they reside outside the local authority area in which the school is situated. Section 86(8) of the SSFA 1998 places an equal duty on local authorities to comply with parental preference in respect of parents living within and outside their boundary."

.... which doesn't answer my question about whether a new school can define a catchment area coinciding with the borough boundary.

It doesn't reference the Rotherham Judgement. However, I think the previous Admissions Code may have done (pretty sure I found that when I was Googling yesterday), and the "point of law" most often quoted from it (e.g. here) is as follows:

"The Rotherham Judgement (1997) established that the principle of admission authorities operating catchment areas as part of their oversubscription criteria in allocating school places was lawful providing that in so doing authorities are not in breach of the Greenwich judgement"

However, I don't think that clarifies anything about whether catchment areas can coincide with borough boundaries or not.

However, I don't think that clarifies anything about whether catchment areas can coincide with borough boundaries or not
Hang on OP, I found some information early that was written by an education law expert.

Let me see if I can find it again and maybe you can contact him by e-mail.

What you want to know is very specialist and I will admit that I don't want to say anything that might be wrong.

Looking back at this Mumsnet thread from 2014, Prh47bridge and another well regarded admissions expert both said that it was fine to have a catchment area coinciding with the borough boundary. It is that point I am interested in. I'm assuming it's allowed provided it can be justified by some other means than "it's the borough boundary". For example "It's an A road" or "It's a railway line" might suffice if they are logical barriers to school travel. However, all of this is conjecture and I feel that reading the Rotherham Judgement itself might help.

Here are two articles that may OR may not be relevant to your issue but they both have authors who may be able to help you with your question.

LAURA THOMPSON
www.emwllp.com/latest/school-admissions-a-learning-curve/
www.emwllp.com/meet-us/?search-main=laura+palmby

HOWARD COHEN
www.farrarsbuilding.co.uk/admission-appeals-now/
www.farrarsbuilding.co.uk/barrister/howard-cohen/

Thanks Persian, yes, those articles are in line with my inferred conclusion that it is potentially ok to coincide a catchment area with a borough boundary so long as your reasoning is sound (which it wasn't in the case of the Bournemouth School).

Probably what I need to do is read a selection of Admissions Adjudicator decisions that cite Greenwich (in addition to the Rotherham Judgement if I ever get hold of it), to get a feel for what is regarded as reasonable and what isn't. It seems it isn't going to be clear cut.

Underneath each of the links to the articles I included the contact details for the authors.

As they are experts in the field and enjoy writing articles about the issue perhaps you might get some good free advice from sending them an e-mail.

Definitely worth a try??

But what if a new school (necessarily an academy, with no formal LA interest) were to define a new catchment area coinciding with the borough boundary, or part of the borough boundary

Reading the judgements won't give you a definitive answer, I'm afraid. However, the view taken by the Schools Adjudicator is that it is fine for part of the catchment area boundary to run along a local authority boundary in most cases but you cannot declare an entire local authority area as the catchment as that would be in breach of the Greenwich judgement. So you cannot, for example, give priority to all pupils living in Hampshire but you may have a catchment area that is entirely within Hampshire with part of the boundary coinciding with the county boundary. You are unlikely to have a problem with using the county boundary unless it is unreasonable to do so.

The Bournemouth school illustrates my point. They wanted to give priority to any pupils living within the area covered by Bournemouth Borough Council. That is a clear breach of the Greenwich judgement. If, like other secondary schools in Bournemouth, they had gone for a much smaller catchment area that lay entirely within the Council's area the Adjudicator would probably have rejected the objection even if part of the catchment boundary ran along the Council boundary.

Not on anyone's list of questions here but I did find this which might suggest the law may in due course change so might be of background interest.

"Conservatives to Review School Admissions
The election manifesto of the Conservative Party contains a proposal to review school admissions with a view to overcoming ‘the unfairness of selection by house price.’ The manifesto document does not provide much detail of what this review might include, other than to confi rm that there would “never” be a mandatory lottery-based admissions policy. However, according to Schools Week, which has published a lengthy article on the issue, the Conservatives are considering introducing ‘doughnut’ catchment areas, those with
an inner and outer ring which can be used to prioritise different numbers of children from different areas thereby avoiding house prices being infl ated closer to good schools.

Schools Week claims that the proposal has been inspired by an admissions case from 2014, where an academy was prevented from recruiting 75 per cent of its pupils from outside its immediate catchment. Dixon’s Music Primary Academy in Bradford reportedly sought permission to award 15 of its 60 places to children living within 1.5 miles, and 45 to those living further away. The school said the proposal was to “attract a more diverse, city-wide intake and to break the pattern of mono-ethnic provision and educational apartheid in our city”. But after reviewing local demand in Bradford’s city centre, where the school is based, the schools adjudicator deemed the proposal “unreasonable” on the grounds that the majority
of places would not be given to children inside an area that needed the places more. The adjudicator also found that transport would be an issue, with children having to travel a long distance each day to far-away schools when there were closer schools with available places.
The thinking behind the proposal is that it would allow poorer families to send their children to good schools in expensive areas, but still live more affordably further away. However, critics point to such arrangements being open to abuse especially for schools in
disadvantaged areas which would be able to allocate places to children living in ‘middle class" areas further afi eld." "

the view taken by the Schools Adjudicator is that it is fine for part of the catchment area boundary to run along a local authority boundary in most cases

Prh47bridge, are you making that assertion based on a collective history of adjudications along those lines? It would be great if you could give me some examples to back it up.

In the years I have been keeping an eye on the Adjudicator's rulings I have seen very few challenges on Greenwich/Rotherham grounds. Most catchment area complaints are about the operation of the catchment area within the school's LA. However, there have been some challenges related to the use of LA boundaries. I have not seen any succeed unless the school has set its catchment area to include all or substantially all of the area covered by the LA. I'm afraid that, as I considered these decisions to be unremarkable, I haven't kept any notes about them so I can't immediately point you to any. You may find some <a class="break-all" href="http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110218211312/www.schoolsadjudicator.gov.uk/decisions_all.cfm?order=lea&casetype=all&year=0&type_of_school=0" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110218211312/www.schoolsadjudicator.gov.uk/decisions_all.cfm?order=lea&casetype=all&year=0&type_of_school=0 here but there are nearly 200 cases referring to catchments listed so it may take some time.

A simpler way of looking at it may be to find councils that publish catchment maps or lists of streets in catchment. You will find that these maps almost invariably show that school catchments are all within the local authority area. For example, Bournemouth Borough Council provides a list of streets that are in catchment for each of their secondary schools. The list does not include any streets that are outside the Borough. Similarly North Tyneside publish a map which you can see here. This shows that all school catchments are contained within the local authority area. Every single school on this map uses the local authority boundary as part of its catchment boundary. Dorset is similar - see here.

Thanks Prh47. That link to the National Archives helped a little in that I was able to quickly download all of the cases referring to catchments, and search them for the word "Greenwich", giving a handful of results of which just 3 were partially relevant to my query:

1. Case reference: ADA/000493, ADA/000494, ADA/000495, 13 February 2004 - objections against a new school which was defining a catchment area based on CofE deaneries which more-or-less coincided with Bromley borough boundaries. The adjudicator said it was fine to use this catchment area for faith applicants, but not for non-faith applicants.

1. Case reference: ADA/000963, 7 July 2006 - objections to a school's catchment area which defined a catchment area based on Lincolnshire's “designated transport area”, which lay entirely within Lincolnshire, partly following the boundary between Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire. This objection was upheld, (which seems to contract what prh47bridge says in his previous post).

1. Case references: ADA/001136; ADA/001160; ADA/001161; ADA/001162; ADA/001166; ADA/001167, 2 August 2007 - several LAs objected to a school designating 60% of its places to residents of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham. The adjudicator upheld the objections, saying "There is no justification for the choice of this area in terms of distance from the school, ease of access or any other defensible reason, the area chosen is simply the borough".

At least that third judgement does imply that there are theoretically some "defensible reasons" though I'm no closer to finding examples, other than religious ones.

I will keep looking, and hope I might get some more suggestions from others too.

The Lincolnshire case refers to an old version of the Admissions Code which was significantly different to the relevant provisions in the current code. But the significant thing in this instance was that the LA was trying to get the school to use a catchment area that coincided with the county boundary whereas the school, as admission authority, had included part of Nottinghamshire in its catchment. This is a case where the admission authority was allowed to do what it wanted, which is what would normally be expected unless they have clearly got it wrong. It does not mean the admission authority would have lost if the boundary had been set using the "designated transport area" and someone had challenged this.

To contradict what I've said you would have to find a case where an admission authority had set a catchment boundary that partly coincided with the local authority boundary and an objection against this had been upheld.

Thanks for the clarification prh.

Looking through some of the cases that didn't mention Greenwich has now started to prove useful too, specifically Case reference: ADA/000541, ADA/000567, ADA/00548, 27th July 2004. It upholds an objection by the LA against a Buckinghamshire Grammar school which was refusing to adopt a proposed new catchment area. There was no mention of the Greenwich judgement at all, and yet the maps of catchment areas seem to map to the borough boundaries when I line them up (see attachment).

They don't seem to provide any obvious justification for aligning the catchments with the borough boundary.

p.s. Buckinghamshire seem a little shy about publishing an up to date map of their catchment areas (instead they have tool on their website that uses your postcode to tell you which catchment areas you're in). The image I posted above was from 2011 and I found it in this document: democracy.buckscc.gov.uk/documents/s19123/DLES14.11%20APPENDIX%20g%20CATCHMENT%20AREAS%20APRIL%202011.pdf

prh47bridge
I am confused now.

I know that the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 and School Admissions Code incorporated the relevant decisions into statue law.

Therefore isn't the SSAFA and the SAC the authority on these issues and do they make the cases pretty much irrelevant now??

Earlier this year I wanted to look at some cases. I tried to use my local University library and was told that I couldnt access Lexis/Nexis as I was not a student at the university and it was a paid for service. So do check that your local university will grant access to you as a non-student. I ended up at the National Library in London. It was quite a lengthy process to join. I had ordered what I needed the day before so didnt need to wait for that as well. But it took all day.

I have to say yet again the court system horrifies me (as a non -legal professional) with its total lack of transparency and access to information for litigants in person. It is not a level playing field at all and not being able to easily access prior judgments and comments makes quite a mockery of the process.

I tried to use my local University library and was told that I couldnt access Lexis/Nexis as I was not a student at the university and it was a paid for service
If the university teaches law then they should have law reports in book form.

LexisNexis hasn't always existed.

When I studied law in 2001-2004, we had to use the law reports in book form a lot.

LexisNexis was handy but our lecturers really liked us to learn to use the old methods as well.