Appeals expertise needed

[Toospotty]

I'm asking for someone else, who may pop up on here herself, but I'll keep my question really brief. An application for Reception on social/medical need has been turned down because the panel said that the school in question did not have a physical feature that it does - fairly recently installed but well and truly there. The case was otherwise very strong and had plenty of appropriate expert support. The parent has been told by the LA admissions people that an appeal would be pointless owing to the class size cap. To me this seems to be a case of panel error. Councillors are concerned and I've suggested that she also contact her MP. Is this situation one likely to be successful in an appeal?

I think that social /medical needs issues are always difficult to advise on because it is so individual.
However from what you have said it would appear it is a very straight forward case of the panel presumably being given some wrong advice on whether this physical feature was there or not. The question really is whether the application would have been successful so that they were considered under a social / medical category if the panel accepted this physical feature existed. Sorry without further specific information it is impossible to know.
What however is clear is that if you were allowed to be considered under the social /medical category that you would have had a much better chance of being allocated a space. The only way that you can know for certain is to appeal. What you absolutely need is photographs of this physical feature - you need to show that it does exist and did exist at the time of the original appeal and that the original panel to assess social /medical needs were given misleading information.
The class size cap comment is rubbish. If the appeal panel is convinced that the physical feature existed at the time of the application for consideration under the social / medical condition, they are convinced that you should have been considered under this admission category and convinced that under those circumstances you would have been allocated a place then you will get a place as a 31st and excepted pupil.

Thank you. I thought, from things I'd read on here in the past, that the class size issue wouldn't prevent an appeal on procedural grounds.

The specifics aren't mine to give, but as a parent who managed to apply successfully on social/medical grounds myself and has therefore read a great deal about it all, I think the case is pretty strong, with very good supporting material. The physical feature in question is a ramp, and indisputably exists, so photos can easily be taken. They were installed two or three years ago.