Help!! Sendist Tribunal looming.

[showers]

We have finally received our date for Tribunal and enclosed in the papers it says that i need to supply the costs of educating my ds at mainstream with a resource unit(school we want him to go to) and costs of the special school(LEA have named in his statement) and transport costs. Has anyone got any idea where i can find out this information from?? LEA are not forthcoming when i have asked.

I would clarify this with tribunal. This is information that the LEA should provide. If they don't they will undoubtedly be asked for it at the hearing. At my ds tribunal, the costs were disussed at the end and exact figures were asked for. The special school costs for my ds place at a school for severe learning difficulties were listed by my lea as being around 19,000. The costs are important but not critical, the tribunal found in our favour even though the school we wanted for ds were well beyond this.

LAs are rubbish about giving this info even when you press them they come up with the argument that as they have paid for the school already it is a nil cost to them.
There are a few ways of getting info

1. By FOI - which can take 20 days and they may try and fob you off with the nil cost argument or try and avoid answering it properly which leaves you with no time left. You can FOI both the LA and the school directly. You can ask to see the school budget and how much is spent on SEN and on the different waves of SEN
2. The LA should publish a budget on its website it used to be called s.52 and is no called s.251 (I think) budget - again this should have useful info
3. You should make a request to SENDIST (request for changes form on their website) and ask for a direction from the Judge that the LA provide the costs for each placement and transport broken down. I only found out about this recently and wish I had used it. The Tribunal should be happy to order it as you have no way for finding out yourself and it puts you on a level playing field. So you just need to ask the Tribunal to direct the LA to provide this info by a certain date on the request for changes form. You can email requests to the Tribunal (ring the Clerk) and they can fast track them if the Tribunal is soon. Enclose any correspondence where you have asked for the info and they have refused.

I would try a few routes as that way you can check the figures you get are accurate eg if the figure on the website is different.

Thankyou all for your advice!! I have been on s.52 and have found a small amout of info but i think the best thing is to ring sendist about finding out the info that i need. No doubt they can force the LEA into giving me what i need.