Telling lies to get a place.

[LordLofty]

I have discovered that the mother of a boy at our school lied about his main residence (she said he stays with his Grandmother through the week) to get a place on appeal. Not sure if I should tell the authorities, what would you do?

I'm puzzled. Telling lies about your address at appeal shouldn't get you a place. You can only argue that the LA has made a mistake if they got the distance from the address on the application form to the school wrong. Saying the child lives somewhere other than the address on the application form is not the basis for a successful appeal. If you aren't suggesting that the LA has made a mistake the appeal is all about the balance of prejudice and, barring disability, the address where the child lives is generally irrelevant.

Having said that, I would always tell the authorities if I knew someone had used a false address.

He lives with his mother in a different catchment then appealed and said he actually spends the week with his grandmother which is right next to the school. A total lie, I assume they say some circumstances changes that this address wasn't used on the application. Also went to primary miles away from catchment.

Please report it - another applicant ( hopefully legitimate ) will loose a place if you don't .

Surely apeal panels are savvy to this sort of thing. If he was given a place there may other reasons. I would have thought the full story is not known.

Unless the appeal panel was very poorly trained this cannot be the reason the appeal was won. As per my last post, there are two basic ways to win an appeal.

The first is to show that the LA has made a mistake. If they have measured the distance from the address given on the application form they clearly have not made a mistake. The parents may say they made a mistake in putting the wrong address on the application but that is not the basis for a successful appeal. The mistake must be by the LA, not the parents.

The other way to win is to show that the prejudice to the child from not being admitted outweighs the prejudice to the school from admitting another child. Unless there is evidence that the journey to the allocated school would cause particular problems for this child the address at which they live is irrelevant.

As I say, unless the appeal panel was very poorly trained I don't think the lie about the address was the reason they won. I would, however, still report the parents.

OP, that is serious accusation, how do you know all this do you sit at your window watching the family??