two copies of a report by the LA - my copy completely different to the one teh school have

[bjkmummy]

son is part time at school due to anxiety. scholl cannot meeet his needs. LA have done nothing to seek a new school placement and we are off to tribunal in feb.

LA promised us he would get all the help and support he needed. school agreed he could come back in sept but only in the 'interim'. So far the support from the LA has been a couple of observations from autism outreach where she said there was nothing wrong with him and could not recommend a single intervention. the class teahcer and head disputed both reports and put their complaint into writing. she came back a 3rd time and finally started talking about 'strategies' to help him. i asked for a copy of the report and i was given a 3 page report and when i read it i thought - yes, finally albeit it was a complete and utter u turn by her. as part of the tribunal process i requested his school file. got his LA file and they admitted that lots of email etc had been deleted. the school file had a copy of this report in it and at first i thought they must have missed copying a page then as i sat and compared it realsied it was the same report but was considerably shorter with hardly any recommendations in it. this is clearly the version she has discussed with school as she has written over it next to teh few thing she had recommended - 'not needed' so actually we are back to not a single thing she can offer him!

i just dont undertsand why there would be 2 versions of the same report - are they that devious? so im left withthe impresssion that she has recommended so much for him when in reality she has offered him absolutely nothing

she is new in post and i have asked teh LA to confirm she is a qualifed teahcer and has ASD qualifications but the LA refuse to tell me so i have sent a request to the tribunal to order them to release the info - a firend has tiold me that she is not a qualified teacher but is a teaching assistant.

not sure what to do - do i lodge a complaint, she is meant to be coming in to do 1:1 with him but to date she has not even phoned the school to arrange anything. i really do not trust her and want her no where near my son but with the tribunal looming do not want to see overly unreasonable but im just shocked that this has happened

I would personally sit on it for a while and maybe submit it as late evidence that the LA are not providing your ds with the necessary support. Her failing to do the things in your version of the report is just fine and will be explored at the tribunal. Interventions in my ds reports were examined by the panel and the school were asked what they had done or actually not done. In many ways her lack of action will probably be to your advantage.

the school are coming as my witness :-) the LA are not sending anyone = just the EP who hasnt seen him since May although I know that is going to be sprung on me at the last minute and the NHS OT who is against them.

the LA told me that the outreach person would be taking no part in the tribunal. Im at the working document stage now and the person from the NAS helping me wanted to put parts of teh report i had into the statement but i took them out at this stage as i need to clarify whether she is a qualified teacher first - i can always put the recommendations back but the ones we were going to use are not in the school version so she never had any intention of doing it.

yes , i think i do need to just sit and wait and then served both versions of the report as my evidence which is due in by the 16th jan so only a few weeks away now and include the emails from the head person of the LA enclosing it and then let the tribunal see both versions. I think noone from the LA is going as they know they will be crucified - people think that due to teh complete lack of action that they are going to concede but take it to teh very end whilst my son remains out of school

i think the LA have to send someone, probably a special needs officer as someone would have to speak on their behalf and be someone who has the authority to do so. However, you may be right that they have no intention of taking it that far and this is why their case is so shoddy. The tribunal panel would have questions that only the lA can answer and so I am pretty sure they would be forced to attend if the tribunal went ahead.

they have instructed a barrister and have a solicitor doing the day to day work - said solicitor asked for permission to watch as she has never been to tribunal before - i objected as we are doing it ourselves and the tribunal agreed and refused permission. i sort of assumed that is the way round it that the barrister is there for them. i can subpoena the LA myself and then serve it on them which could be fun!