new core assessment has been done post tribunal and im not happy

[bjkmummy]

sons mainstream placement broke down , he was out of school for a year, long long battle with the LA over school placement ended up at tribunal where we won a very expensive independent ASD school placement.

son started there in may. during the year he was out of school we were ignored by everyone and as we get direct payment we have a social worker. she went underground in the year as she sits in the LA inclusion team so heard everything that was being said during the tribunal period.

once we won the tribunal she reappeared as if by magic. I told her how disappointed in here I was as she ha dnot been there in the most difficult year of my sons life.

she decided to redo a core assessment on my son. he gets 15 hours direct payments each month. this decision was made in april and I finally got the core assessment by email yesterday at 4pm.

she refused to do a carers assessment. we have 2 boys with asd and this son has a twin sister - she basically has refused to look at the whole families needs. she went to the new school and 3 members of the staff spoke to her and made it clear she must look at the needs of the family as a whole and that if my son is to have overnight respite then this needs to be a long process and cant be rushed.

report has come and its really upset me. she keeps talking about him having emotional and behavourial difficulties???? that the school placement needs to be carefully monitored regarding meeting his academic needs??? she says this more than once. she talks at length about the history and how many people in the early years - most employed by this LA - said he didn't have autism - we would move counties and on his first day in a new school the school called me in and said it was clear he had autism and they were brilliant in pushing him to be dx - stupidly due to my husbands job a year later we moved back here.

she has said no increase to his direct payments but for me to maybe see if I can find someone to have him overnight but this will not be consider for at least another 6 months.

she talks about my daughter accessing guides - she starts in sept and other musical theatre groups - this is all at the moment on a knife edge as I simply am struggling to get her there with the two asd boys. I was hoping that if my hours were increased I could pay for someone to sit with both boys whilst I take her - dh works most evenings so I am alone with them. I f we want to go out as a couple we can pay ourselves for a sitter which cost £18 per hour - so we are not going to do that!

basically I feel the whole process was pointless - put us through this for nothing. she makes comment on how we paid for private reports. my daughters needs have just been completely ignored as have the needs of the family as a whole despite the school being very clear with her to do this. she is also saying that once he has been at the school longer then his needs at home will decrease - didn't know his new school could cure autism as well!!!

I wish now I had never bothered and just want her to go away and not engage further. this is the social worker who told me when I said how traumatic the tribunal process had been that I should consider when my elder son goes through transition next year I should consider carefully what benefit to him it would be if I attended the LA run transition events as it will make other LA members of staff feel uncomfortable after what happened over the tribunal.

Complain to her supervisor - in writing and ask for a change of social worker. I changed ours as the 1st was lovely but as effective as talking to a care bear.

Its not uncommon for LAs who lost to throw their toys out of the pram and continue to be foul to you, we've had 3 years of this. I have always asked for less DP than we need because I can't bear putting myself all the 'greedy' parent slurs that would result, because as far as they see it we have a fully funded ABA programme and thats more than any other family so why should we get anything more. The fact we also have 2 other children whose holidays and after school activities are dictated by DS3 doesn't register. ABA is great but its a huge commitment for the whole family.

It obviously depends how much you need the DP or if you can find other ways round it eg a helpful parent to take her to guides or theatre? Sometimes you just have to ask other parents outright. I try and do a swap to say if I have x after school will you take DS1 to football for me. I've also learnt that so many parents who work have problems juggling that often they need help too eg picking up from school and are happy to reciprocate with evening and weekend activities.

The LA can't refuse to do a carers assessment. They can of course do an assessment which says none of your needs are critical or substantial. You could also send the report back crossing out all the irrelevant information and write next to it 'not relevant'. Its not for this sw to comment on education they employ people to monitor placements.

I do know someone who got (via a LGO complaint) their middle and only non disabled child recognised as a child in need, so you can try and challenge it. You could insist on a carers assessment. You could ask for a review of the decision.

But, and I say this from experience, the stress of having these people in your life and the constant battle and nastiness can actually take more of your reserves and cause more stress than the benefit you can get. I have cut out as many 'professionals' as I can and see them as little as possible because its more hassle than its worth. I actually find life easier without them. They think this money is their money and hate us for getting a big chunk of it. They forget I am a taxpayer too!

There may be alternatives eg other parents. Local carers charities sometimes run sitter services.

I have sold out all my principles and got DS1 into a private school on a bursary and one of the main reasons for doing that has been so he doesn't miss out on the after school activities, sports etc & gets extra help with homework as I know I cannot do it all and he is missing out. I never in a million years thought I would send a child to private school but its going to take so much pressure off us.

She has also spoken to his school about my daughter accessing their sibling group they run once a year for 8 weeks and got her name out down for me! Quite how I am meant to do it when we live over 40 miles from the school I don't know! It's run in the evening so wold have to drive an hour to get there and who I would get to look after the boys I have no idea, I can't take them with me but shes just arranged it without speaking to me first. She contradicts herself throughout it it -one minute she says school seen no aggression/upset then in the next paragraph confirm the school are seeing this behaviour! She was trying to say npbehaviour only at home not at school which is simply untrue. That is something they tried to argue in the tribunal that his needs were not 'high' enough to warrant a place at the school, no evidence of challenging behaviour which again was untrue they just chose to ignore the reports where it was mentioned!

I agree Agnes with your final points and that's how I feel. I will take the direct payments I get and leave it there. I am about to do a reassessment of his dla, I have decided if we are successful with that then will will use that money for additional respite that we will organise ourselves. My daughter herself is very behind at school, the school feel she is dyslexic. Plus we had to move her from the school where her twin went to even though he moved schools as she was know as the sister of x child and she needed a clean break. She is now in a school that has only 20 kids and no one knows her history except her teacher and head. The head is fantastic and understands how things are at home.

It could be worth instructing solicitors who specialise in community care to look at this. You may get legal aid in ds's name to challenge it.

^ what Ogg said ^ Complaint in writing.

I've still to challenge an old SW report. It claimed we didn't need any respite because Dh is a university lecturer and needs to support me instead of doing research in school holidays.

I was dealing with too much at the time and live elsewhere now, but I do need to ensure that should ds ever access his files he understands that DH' JOB is research and he's contracted for taking no more than 20 days a year, which is a) probably fewer days than the SW gets and b) almost entirely spent on ds-related stuff depriving the other kids of his time or a family holiday.

They really are numpties some of them, and this was our third after I complained about the first two.

You'll probably get ruled 'out of time'. I think it's 3 months in our authority.

I remember when you got that report - seems like decades ago

It's out of time to complain about it, but not to insist that the information contained on us is false under the DPA and should therefore be corrected.

It was just over 2 years ago now. HTF are people supposed to complain about the sheer scores and scores of mistreatment and maladministration issues as they actually happen? I'd need a large office full of people working full-time for that.

I don't care for complaining about them now tbh. That place was not just a sad place to live but I realise now a bloody horrible place to work too with the employees getting recruited for their inability to have any nouse of their own and their subsequent ability to be scapegoated and treated appallingly. They are made to believe their misery is instigated by parents/clients etc. and not their employers of course. I'm just pleased I left.

Crumbs! 2 years ago already. I lot has happened in that time.

It's impossible to 'keep up' with all the complaints that could/should be made. Simply impossible.

You did the best thing by walking away and not letting them rob you of another precious moment that you could use to greater benefit.

I wouldn't want to for an LA - the do sound very fucked up organisations.

meant to say 'work for an LA'

Yep. In new LA I have refused to 'register' with anyone except school admissions for dd and a GP.

The local children's centre have our names and the first part of our postcode but that took a long time considering before I decided that the benefits might be worth it for our baby, though have refused HV involvement, or any of those stupid developmental checks where they tell you your classically autistic 2yr old is developing normally and refer you on for your anxiety.

I'm actually on holiday at the moment - gone back to the place where we used to live. Currently sat in a lovely coffee shop with my daughter enjoy the escape front the boys. Being here has given me some clarity of what journey we have been through in the last two years. When we lived here, we were supported by professional, they helped us get the younger boy dx. The older boy was in a fantastic asd school. We didn't get respite at all like we do now so why do i find myself thinking that by moving to the new area was a mistake, the grass wasn't greener and for what we have benefited from, the last two years have made me a worse person, I have been to hell and back and the hell is continuing. I would move counties in a heartbeat if I could guarantee my younger sons school placement - might google it to see how far from here it is. My husband is miserable in his job and if we came back he would get to work back on the fast jets he craves rather than stuck in a factory all day. The other problem I have is my elder son - he is in a school now year 8 where he is happy, he's made it clear he does not want to move at all. Also the current LA screwed me over on his statement as they wanted him into DSP at an academy - I wanted special school so they gave it us but wrote a long detailed point in part 4 that he was only placed in a special school due to parental choice and if we refuse to transport him he would be placed in the academy. We also moved there as my best friend was there so I had a support network but she has since moved to Texas! There is nothing really to keep us where we live, I absolutely hate it but feel condemned to stay here until the children finish secondary so got 8 years of this crap ahead of me.