Off to Tribunal

[rosielou678]

Evidence deadline was today. LA has had all my evidence for 4 weeks and have ignored all requests for a meeting. LA has just come through with their evidence- they will be fighting us. So we will be heading to Tribunal. Putting aside that they have ignored all my experts' opinions, they have said the cost of place at their school is £575 - totally ignoring the fact that they should be using the figures of £6k. If they had used these correct figures then their figures match the indie school. We get to the indie school fees even if we agree with their extremely low level of provision.

The LA school, who told my independent EP that they don't have the experience, have now told the LA EP that they can help.

I am furious and disappointed that once against LA seem to think that they are above the law.

It depends but many do not want to get involved in LA matters. You could contact your councillor but again this often depends on the individual councillor

Rosie - hope you get somewhere with this. My experience of your LA was bad but not shockingly bad - I then moved counties and have experienced hell on earth (arstriches galore) .

Blimey, where did you move to?

Can't say too much here Star. The damage caused to our family has been immense - no-one will acknowledge this, too busy covering their arses. I am hopeful that their backsides will be bitten sharply one day soon .

Join our campaigning work!

What makes me angry is that the government keeps piously justifying bringing in new legislation by saying that the current system doesn't work. But the main reason the current system doesn't work is that local authorities keep ignoring their legal duties, because they know that they can get away with it in most cases. And there's absolutely nothing in the new legislation that is going to make that a jot better.

I will be getting in touch with my MP. This alone will be an interesting conversation not least because of the comtempt the LA has for the indie school where my son so spectacularly failed in (or failed by, depending on your viewpoint). My local MP is a school governor there.

Stillfighting - I have only posted on Mumsnet a per snippet of Essex County Council's behaviour towards me. And only posted about their behaviour this year. I still have last year's total fiasco and bullying to write about

Unless, of course, I get gagged.

IE I am already part of the campaign group

Nenypops - absolutely. And the groups 'campaigning' on this seem to have given up the ghost on that. The EDCM keeps tweeting about 'joined up working' between LA/NHS.

Well, you know what? I think they've been a bit too bloody 'joined up' in my view!

Stillfighting - sorry - haven't matched all our email names to posters.

Rosie - I would be interested in hearing how you get on. Have you seen David Wolfe's SEN law summary in case there is anything useful on there - here

I'm a regular name-changer IE so you wouldn't recognise me. We have chatted this week and you did me a big favour with a contact name

IE - there's a couple of David Wolfe's case summary that may be of use. Thanks for that.

The thing that infuriates me the most is the breaking of laws designed to protect the most vulnerable of our society. Not only do the LAs break these laws, but no-one is at all interested that laws HAVE been broken. If I walked into a shop and stole something, I would quite rightly be punished for breaking a very clear law. Yet if the LA break the laws then, unless the parent is to go all the way to court, they get away with it. And even if the parents do go to court, there's no guarantee that the LA breaking the law will even have any relevance whatsoever on their child's case.

Aaarggh.... stillfightingforjustice - I know who you are

Rosie. I agree. I couldn't agree more. I am still pursuing funding for a joint research project into this very area. That and campaigning and blogging and tweeting is as much as I can do.

But I tell, I am shocked that so little interest is paid to this even by those working on issues concerning vulnerable people more broadly - newspapers etc. Poor treatment of the elderly makes the news, but no one gives a toss about children.

We need to all tweet at journos to start taking this on board!

I think many people in the UK would be truly horrified, and do believe that dc with disabilities have a right to care, education, the NHS etc.

But from the vitriol about benefits, scroungers, badly-behaved dc etc, and the easy way that awful words are bandied around as 'just a joke, get over it', there are clearly plenty of people in this country who would prefer to take our passports away, then stick us on a plane to who knows where.

my LA were very similar and behaved terribly throughout the tribunal process and many a time i wanted to give up but you guys on here held my hand and i kept on going. we won but the stress of it all was unbearable but what choice do we have? my LA are now telling everyone that tribunal will always side with parents if they get independent reports so im hoping they have somehow learnt a valuable lesson. of course its simply not true what they are saying but if it makes tehm think twice before screwing the next parent over then my pain would have been worth it. at the meeting the LA said this, the parent partnership officer turned round and said to them that if they work with parents instead then they would not end up being in a tribunal situation.