advice re asking the tribunal to make an order to disclose information

[bjkmummy]

i am trying to get the LA to tell me if the autism outreach person is a qualified teacher and has an additional qualification in autism.

The LA refuse to answer the question as 'it is not their policy to disclose individual qualifications of staff members'

i know she aint a qualified teacher as last year they made the last autism outreach person redundant and she was a qualified teacher and then employed 'an inclusion officer for autism' thereby dropping the teaching part oout of the job title. they asked for the person preferably to be qualified with a degree and ideally have a qualification in education, social care etc but didnt specify autism!

the new outreach woman been horrific and said there is nothing wrong with my son despite every single report disputing her findings. she has now spectaculary backtracked and written 3 pages of strategies for him - some of them i would quite like to put into the statement as she talks about him needing sensory circuits twice a day for minutes! the code of practice says taht advice used to be from someone with a ateaching qualification plus they have put 'he shoudl ahve access to a her' but do not specify or quantify it.

so do i should ask the tribunal to order the LA to answer the question or do i also need to send teh correspondence where i have made the request, they refused to answer so asked them again and gave another deadline which they have again just ignored?

the LA have incidentally made a big thing about the qualifications of the staff at the specialist ASD school i am fighting for. i know every member of staff is qualified

Just request that the tribunal ask the LA to disclose this information, explain that you have previously asked the LA but they witheld (probably haven't got a clue either themselves) this info.

i think the do know wasuup but they just dont want to answer the question - we live in a small county so everyone knows everything about everyone - just seen the blinking woman in the post office! yesterday at a local cafe half of the LA were there and last week they were all in the pub i was at! i know that in her last job in county she was a HLTA and im sure shes pretty experienced with ASD but more with the non verbal kids.

thank you - i will do the order today and then I can just email it rather than having to photocopy lots of letters etc and then post it. i am conscious of time now as my final submissons due mid jan and what with the xmas shutdown period time is rapidly running away.

Ask them for the minimum required qualifications and experience is for the role and ask them for the job description, so not personal.

that have answered that star by saying qualifcations were desirable as was experience but i want to know specifically if she is qualified as a teacher and with an asd qualification. i already have a copy of the job description as i googled it and found it as the post only filled earlier this year! they have down graded the job role so they dont have to have someone as highly qualified as a teacher. some of her recommendations are very very wishy washy and i dont have confidence in her abilities at all - trying desperately to sound like it is not a personal issue but the LA have basically said taht they will listen to the outreach person and go with her recommendations over a qualified OT SALT and his class and head teacher hence why I want to know. The LA officer in a meeting when i asked outright if she was qualified screeched at me that she was highly qualified but i asked then - is she a qualified teacher? the way she reacted showed i had clearly hit a very very raw nerve

Is she going to be at the tribunal? If so you could ask her directly.

DO get these details in advance though if you can. We had our LA saying that they 'thought' the autism outreach had done a course in autism, and that was as good as her having done it .

no and noone from the LA is going - they are calling ed psych and NHS OT who is against them. they also have a barrister. previous correspondence from the LA says that the autism bod will play no part in the tribunal as they wanted her to take his views. the LA are even denying who is the person dealing with his case - feel like he is a hot potatoe that noone wants to take responsibility for. the outreach woman has also been and visited my school choice and wrote a report dissing it and also questioned the qualifications of the staff so feel its only fair if shes chucking the stones to ensure that she is qualified to be chucking them!

Have you got their refusal to give you this info in writing? If not get it by writing asking sweetly for the information and getting a refusal for the crappy reasons they have told you. I would then write to the tribunal asking them if they are able to ask the LA for the info on your behalf. It seems clear that they dont wish to disclose this info because she isnt qualified. at one of our tribunals the judge asked both the LA and us to provide info on the qualifications of the LA school and the independent school we wanted. The TA in the LA ss had a certificate in catering and in the independent a level 3 NVQ relevant to being a teaching assistant. With the teachers it was also revealing. They were also asked to disclose a list of all the autism specific training, particular staff had done. This was similarly interesting and might be worth requesting.

yes it is in writing from someone quite high up in the LA, i then responded back in writing asking again and giving a further date for response which they have ignored. I learnt the hard way to get everything in writing!!! yes, re qualifications - i am intending in getting it all in writing.

the LA in our case asked for cv's of nursery staff and ABA staff so we in return asked for outreach staff cv and got it

I would ask the Tribunal to order the LA to provide the CV of the specific people who they say will deliver the intervention. I would also point to (enclose it if you can) the info where the LA is raising queries about the staff at the school you want and say in your request as the LA have raised qualifications and expertise as an issue then this is relevant to the tribunal and the LA should provide the CV's of its own staff.