Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Primary education

Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

Flip

Original poster

anyone been to a formal hearing infront of a complaints committee?

4 replies

asecretlemonadedrinker · 29/06/2011 11:55

I have to reply to a reply (!) and say I want one. What am I letting myself in for? It's to do with a complaint about DSs school, the head and some of the teachers. Can I take a solicitor?

thankyou so much if you can help me

OP posts:

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

admission · 30/06/2011 00:03

This is a formal complaint, so i assume it is with a governing body committee as it involves the head teacher. Whilst the school cannot stop you from involving a solicitor, it will without doubt get very messy if you do. What will happen will be that the GB committee will have to have legal representation and the head / teachers will undoubtedly involve their union solicitors as they will not go to such a complaint meeting knowing you have a solicitor in tow.
I am not saying do not do it but I suspect you are much more likely to get the complaint resolved to your satisfaction and quicker if you do not have a solicitor present. Save the solicitor for if the case goes against you at this formal complaint level.

nlondondad · 30/06/2011 14:41

I have conducted a formal complaint hearing. I endorse the advice regarding a solicitor. It would have made things much more complicated. Instead the complainant brought a friend to help her, who was an ex governor at the school. It was agreed to try and not have a formal hearing -although we were all ready to do that -but go to informal mediation on the spot. This worked, resolved the issue. So we never got to the formal hearing stage.

We were able to use the formal procedure framework as a guide, and not a cage.

Legal advice was neither needed or appropriate.

(phew!)

Original poster

asecretlemonadedrinker · 30/06/2011 18:43

OK, thats a relief - I think! Have alot of paperwork to sort through myself though - 9 pages and 32 appendixes (Appendi?) I am very scared I'll be interrogated - I found the report very very biased towards the school , will the committee be the same?

OP posts:

admission · 30/06/2011 21:58

The panel should not be biased towards the school but by the same token it will and can only work on the basis of evidence that is put in front of them. So you do need real evidence rather than just your view of what happened.

Flip