A Parent's Story - G v Southwark LEA (July 2008)
"Without the help we received from Douglas Silas, our son, in our opinion, would have had no real future.
Because of Douglas and his incredible knowledge, skill, hard work and empathy, he now has a future, which, as any parent is concerned, particularly a parent of a child with SEN, is everything.
S is our eldest son. He is 11 and has high-functioning autism. He has a younger brother who is 9. We live in Southwark, London.
S sped through all his milestones, often ahead of his peers and was extremely happy and easy. By the age of 19 months S could sing ‘Moon River’ (pitch perfect) and count to 25. We thought he was gifted.
Gradually however, at around 2.5/3, we started to compile a growing list of things that were at odds with his peers and pressed to have him assessed. The diagnosis came on July 6th 2000. He was assessed by the LEA child developmental team as having high-functioning autism. We don’t suppose we shall ever forget that date. The shock, distress and grief of this revelation was unequalled and complete. In our minds he was going to grow up to be one sort of person. Then it changed. He isn’t that person – he’s a different person, but no less wonderful. But the pain about that will never quite go away because the loss of a dream is a very big loss indeed.
We quickly found a place for S at a Southwark mainstream state school with a high proportion of statemented children. The first hurdle was that despite the diagnosis and all the evidence, Southwark deemed it unnecessary to assess S for a Statement of special educational needs. The only deduction to be made, for this conclusion, was because he was bright, happy, verbal and didn’t have any behavioural issues. The fact that he couldn’t access the vast majority of the curriculum didn’t seem to be important!
We immediately challenged this unrealistic decision and fought for him to be assessed by asking all the professionals involved to re-state their evidence. We won. It was also our introduction to the fact that the LEA will first refuse help and that we would only get the help that S needed if we were prepared to put in the considerable time and energy into fighting our corner. There was also a sickening realisation at this point that there are very few people who are in a position to do this and the LEA takes full advantage of this fact. What does the future hold for those children?
So, we were thrilled with the U-turn but then swiftly aggrieved that the five 1-1 hours per week he was awarded were devoid of any autism-trained teachers/learning support assistants.
We would say, without reservation however, that the school did their absolute best for S, but with no real support from Southwark. S progressed well, socially and academically though he never realised the promise of those very early years. The school did everything within their means and funding (and quite frankly beyond it) as a mainstream school. Speech and Language therapy, after Reception, was woefully inadequate and in recent years had continued to decline. (The SaLT provision has recently been further reduced and the school was offered 4 days of SaLT for an entire year for 50 students!)
We wasted so much time waiting and hoping for something to improve. It didn’t and we ended up funding our own SaLT, S having by then lost out on a couple of years worth of vital therapy. Over the years the hours on his statement were increased to 20. I think we were pretty lucky, judging by the other stories we’ve heard, and only an extremely strongly worded letter was needed to turn around the LEA’s refusal to increase hours.
Up to Year 3 (age7/8) we had always felt that S would manage well in a small, gentle (if there is such a thing?!), mainstream secondary school with a high level of support. However, by the beginning of Year 4 we started to see the gap widening considerably between S and his peers. We also started to wonder if it was good for his self esteem to be in an environment where he would always be trying to ‘be like everyone else’ and no doubt, all but ‘hanging on’. Our utmost desire for S at school was that he should be in an environment where he’d feel happy and feel like he ‘belonged’, where the lessons would be directed at his level, not at the rest of the class, with him always having to have his work differentiated.
So we started looking at schools, 22 in all, and were shocked to discover the very real lack of provision for someone who needs to be in a calm, specialist environment, and yet does not have very severe needs or behavioural problems. We toyed with the idea of moving to be closer to desirable schools only to be advised that as the vast majority of places at specialist schools are LEA funded, actually living close to the school does not actually put you at an advantage. Depending on the LEA concerned, it could actually make the case more difficult, finding you’ve uprooted your whole family and then finding your child won’t be funded for that school.
Throughout Year 4 and 5 we looked at mainstream, state and independent schools, autism units attached to schools, LEA specialist and independent specialist schools.
To cut a long school search story short, we heard about St Mary’s in Bexhill in a chance conversation. We visited without S and felt it was the most suitable place we’d seen to meet his needs. (S has relatively good cognition, no behavioural issues, but with very high need for sensory integration therapy). We then submitted his papers to St Mary’s and they offered him a 4 day residential assessment. We had to pay for this. We were in our rights to ask Southwark to fund this assessment but they were already saying they wouldn’t pay for provision for S out of borough, so rather than wasting time fighting this, we went ahead and had the assessment done without their blessing.
St Mary’s are very specific in the profile of children they accept and fortunately their feedback, post-assessment, was that they felt it would be a very good placement for S. This was in January of Year 6.
We knew we would need to find a solicitor as we were in no doubt that we weren’t in for an easy ride with Southwark.
We had made it clear to Southwark in October of Year 6 that we would not be applying for places at any of the schools in the borough as we felt none were in any way appropriate and that we were in the process of looking for an appropriate setting outside of the borough for S.
The deadline for the LEA to send out the final Statement with their choice of school placement in Part 4 was 15th February. There is nothing you can do in terms of an appeal until you have the final Statement. They duly waited until the very last day possible to send it out, although, they undoubtedly had already made their decision of where S should go back in October!
On receiving it on February14th, we then went ahead and made an appointment with Douglas. From our research there only seemed to be 3 or 4 solicitors who are really specialising in the SEN area, and the only real reason we went for Douglas was because we thought there’d be lots of meetings involved and he therefore made sense as he’s based in London. In actual fact we had one lengthy meeting with him at his offices and everything else was done via email/phone until the SENDIST hearing.
Thankfully, by whatever means, we came to the right person!
The LEA named their secondary autism provision for secondary transfer. We felt this was entirely inappropriate for S’s needs. S has very clear speech. He was working at level 2 in all areas and would be placed in a class of 10 children who all but one were non-verbal and the majority still working at P-levels. S needed a high degree of speech and language therapy (for comprehension and social understanding), but the school only had one SaLT, who was not employed by the school, who came in 2 days a week. There was no OT provision and although the school had a ‘sensory room’, that certainly would not equate, in any way, to sensory integration therapy.
That first meeting was a few hours, with Douglas, at his office where we talked in great detail about S. We took along copies of all of S’s paperwork including his statement. It was an extremely relaxed occasion (made so by Douglas), considering we were waiting to hear whether or not he thought we might have a good case – something that was clearly going to affect S’s future. Neither of us had ever really had any dealings with a solicitor, but we both felt that it was nothing like what we were expecting. In short, warm, welcoming, relaxing, clear, empathetic and ethical.
Douglas felt, having read through S’s reports and spoken with us that there was a good case to be made to the SENDIST for S to go to our preferred school and not the school named by our LEA. We felt very confident that he would not take up our case and proceed with it, if he didn’t truly believe in it.
He explained that we needed to provide expert assessment reports and very carefully put us in contact with the educational psychologist, speech and language therapist and occupational therapist whose knowledge and expertise he felt best matched S. Douglas has a wide experience of working with many professionals in the field. He was also very clear and realistic about the costs involved.
The weeks ahead were quite frenetic with activity. Douglas kept us totally informed at every step and asked for our input where needed. It was a real race against time to gather together the assessment reports and for Douglas to put the case together in time to be given a hearing date for the tribunal before the summer holidays. I have no idea how he managed it! Douglas is a breathtakingly hard worker, knows the law inside out and upside down, is extremely pleasant under pressure and he is emotionally involved as well. He really understands what is at stake here, not only for the child in question, but the whole family. He is a parent himself.
Alas, we were given a date in September – which would have meant there would be no chance for S (if we were to win!) to start at school for the new school year. However, through great skill, speed and knowledge of the system, Douglas managed to negotiate with the SENDIST an expedited date and we were given July 1st.
There is a considerable level of strain involved in the lead up to the hearing. It felt like the only date in our world at that time.
Douglas had asked us in advance to prepare a few words to say to the panel about S and also suggested we bring along a photograph of him. In every other way, the hearing was entirely led for us by Douglas. There were three areas of argument to our case:
1. an appropriate peer group;
2. proper provision of fully integrated therapies (speech and language, occupational therapy and sensory integration therapy) delivered by trained, on-staff therapists; and
3. a waking day curriculum (residential).
We were represented by Douglas, the educational psychologist and the lead speech and language therapist from St Mary’s school. Southwark were represented by their solicitor and the headteacher of their named school (neither of whom had ever met S). The panel was made up of 3 members.
It was a highly charged and emotional day. We arrived at 9am and left at 3.30 (with a break for lunch). We felt that it had gone quite well, (given that our LEA had not assessed S and had provided no new evidence), but were well aware that it is impossible to tell and in any case were terrified of feeling too positive.
The two week wait for the outcome seemed like the longest time in the world. Just as soon as he’d received notification of the result, Douglas called us. ”You’ve won!!”, were the glorious words. I think, only then did we realise what a strain we’d been under.
In actual fact, we only won by default. Of our 3 areas of argument, the panel had agreed that the LEA school could not provide the first two, however they did not feel that S required a waking day curriculum. The fact that our preferred school was too far to travel to on a daily basis, and the LEA hadn’t suggested any other school, meant that the LEA had to name St Mary’s as S’s placement. But by whatever means, win we did, which meant S’s future could begin.
We were advised at the start of this process by our local Parent Partnership organisation that ‘the SENDIST don’t like it if you take along your own solicitor’. This statement keeps ringing in my ears as quite the most terrible piece of advice. There is no way at all that we could have won this case without Douglas representing us. The level of legal knowledge required in a very specialised area, with LEAs bent on putting up as many barriers as possible, is quite breathtaking. We have no doubt whatever, that we would not have won without him.
As I said, without Douglas’ help, we feel that S wouldn’t be in the position he is now, which is somewhere where we feel that he has a very real and promising future. He has now been at St Mary’s for one term and is positively flourishing.
Douglas is someone who we would unreservedly recommend to anyone needing legal help with a child with special needs.
We cannot thank him enough."
Because of Douglas and his incredible knowledge, skill, hard work and empathy, he now has a future, which, as any parent is concerned, particularly a parent of a child with SEN, is everything.
S is our eldest son. He is 11 and has high-functioning autism. He has a younger brother who is 9. We live in Southwark, London.
S sped through all his milestones, often ahead of his peers and was extremely happy and easy. By the age of 19 months S could sing ‘Moon River’ (pitch perfect) and count to 25. We thought he was gifted.
Gradually however, at around 2.5/3, we started to compile a growing list of things that were at odds with his peers and pressed to have him assessed. The diagnosis came on July 6th 2000. He was assessed by the LEA child developmental team as having high-functioning autism. We don’t suppose we shall ever forget that date. The shock, distress and grief of this revelation was unequalled and complete. In our minds he was going to grow up to be one sort of person. Then it changed. He isn’t that person – he’s a different person, but no less wonderful. But the pain about that will never quite go away because the loss of a dream is a very big loss indeed.
We quickly found a place for S at a Southwark mainstream state school with a high proportion of statemented children. The first hurdle was that despite the diagnosis and all the evidence, Southwark deemed it unnecessary to assess S for a Statement of special educational needs. The only deduction to be made, for this conclusion, was because he was bright, happy, verbal and didn’t have any behavioural issues. The fact that he couldn’t access the vast majority of the curriculum didn’t seem to be important!
We immediately challenged this unrealistic decision and fought for him to be assessed by asking all the professionals involved to re-state their evidence. We won. It was also our introduction to the fact that the LEA will first refuse help and that we would only get the help that S needed if we were prepared to put in the considerable time and energy into fighting our corner. There was also a sickening realisation at this point that there are very few people who are in a position to do this and the LEA takes full advantage of this fact. What does the future hold for those children?
So, we were thrilled with the U-turn but then swiftly aggrieved that the five 1-1 hours per week he was awarded were devoid of any autism-trained teachers/learning support assistants.
We would say, without reservation however, that the school did their absolute best for S, but with no real support from Southwark. S progressed well, socially and academically though he never realised the promise of those very early years. The school did everything within their means and funding (and quite frankly beyond it) as a mainstream school. Speech and Language therapy, after Reception, was woefully inadequate and in recent years had continued to decline. (The SaLT provision has recently been further reduced and the school was offered 4 days of SaLT for an entire year for 50 students!)
We wasted so much time waiting and hoping for something to improve. It didn’t and we ended up funding our own SaLT, S having by then lost out on a couple of years worth of vital therapy. Over the years the hours on his statement were increased to 20. I think we were pretty lucky, judging by the other stories we’ve heard, and only an extremely strongly worded letter was needed to turn around the LEA’s refusal to increase hours.
Up to Year 3 (age7/8) we had always felt that S would manage well in a small, gentle (if there is such a thing?!), mainstream secondary school with a high level of support. However, by the beginning of Year 4 we started to see the gap widening considerably between S and his peers. We also started to wonder if it was good for his self esteem to be in an environment where he would always be trying to ‘be like everyone else’ and no doubt, all but ‘hanging on’. Our utmost desire for S at school was that he should be in an environment where he’d feel happy and feel like he ‘belonged’, where the lessons would be directed at his level, not at the rest of the class, with him always having to have his work differentiated.
So we started looking at schools, 22 in all, and were shocked to discover the very real lack of provision for someone who needs to be in a calm, specialist environment, and yet does not have very severe needs or behavioural problems. We toyed with the idea of moving to be closer to desirable schools only to be advised that as the vast majority of places at specialist schools are LEA funded, actually living close to the school does not actually put you at an advantage. Depending on the LEA concerned, it could actually make the case more difficult, finding you’ve uprooted your whole family and then finding your child won’t be funded for that school.
Throughout Year 4 and 5 we looked at mainstream, state and independent schools, autism units attached to schools, LEA specialist and independent specialist schools.
To cut a long school search story short, we heard about St Mary’s in Bexhill in a chance conversation. We visited without S and felt it was the most suitable place we’d seen to meet his needs. (S has relatively good cognition, no behavioural issues, but with very high need for sensory integration therapy). We then submitted his papers to St Mary’s and they offered him a 4 day residential assessment. We had to pay for this. We were in our rights to ask Southwark to fund this assessment but they were already saying they wouldn’t pay for provision for S out of borough, so rather than wasting time fighting this, we went ahead and had the assessment done without their blessing.
St Mary’s are very specific in the profile of children they accept and fortunately their feedback, post-assessment, was that they felt it would be a very good placement for S. This was in January of Year 6.
We knew we would need to find a solicitor as we were in no doubt that we weren’t in for an easy ride with Southwark.
We had made it clear to Southwark in October of Year 6 that we would not be applying for places at any of the schools in the borough as we felt none were in any way appropriate and that we were in the process of looking for an appropriate setting outside of the borough for S.
The deadline for the LEA to send out the final Statement with their choice of school placement in Part 4 was 15th February. There is nothing you can do in terms of an appeal until you have the final Statement. They duly waited until the very last day possible to send it out, although, they undoubtedly had already made their decision of where S should go back in October!
On receiving it on February14th, we then went ahead and made an appointment with Douglas. From our research there only seemed to be 3 or 4 solicitors who are really specialising in the SEN area, and the only real reason we went for Douglas was because we thought there’d be lots of meetings involved and he therefore made sense as he’s based in London. In actual fact we had one lengthy meeting with him at his offices and everything else was done via email/phone until the SENDIST hearing.
Thankfully, by whatever means, we came to the right person!
The LEA named their secondary autism provision for secondary transfer. We felt this was entirely inappropriate for S’s needs. S has very clear speech. He was working at level 2 in all areas and would be placed in a class of 10 children who all but one were non-verbal and the majority still working at P-levels. S needed a high degree of speech and language therapy (for comprehension and social understanding), but the school only had one SaLT, who was not employed by the school, who came in 2 days a week. There was no OT provision and although the school had a ‘sensory room’, that certainly would not equate, in any way, to sensory integration therapy.
That first meeting was a few hours, with Douglas, at his office where we talked in great detail about S. We took along copies of all of S’s paperwork including his statement. It was an extremely relaxed occasion (made so by Douglas), considering we were waiting to hear whether or not he thought we might have a good case – something that was clearly going to affect S’s future. Neither of us had ever really had any dealings with a solicitor, but we both felt that it was nothing like what we were expecting. In short, warm, welcoming, relaxing, clear, empathetic and ethical.
Douglas felt, having read through S’s reports and spoken with us that there was a good case to be made to the SENDIST for S to go to our preferred school and not the school named by our LEA. We felt very confident that he would not take up our case and proceed with it, if he didn’t truly believe in it.
He explained that we needed to provide expert assessment reports and very carefully put us in contact with the educational psychologist, speech and language therapist and occupational therapist whose knowledge and expertise he felt best matched S. Douglas has a wide experience of working with many professionals in the field. He was also very clear and realistic about the costs involved.
The weeks ahead were quite frenetic with activity. Douglas kept us totally informed at every step and asked for our input where needed. It was a real race against time to gather together the assessment reports and for Douglas to put the case together in time to be given a hearing date for the tribunal before the summer holidays. I have no idea how he managed it! Douglas is a breathtakingly hard worker, knows the law inside out and upside down, is extremely pleasant under pressure and he is emotionally involved as well. He really understands what is at stake here, not only for the child in question, but the whole family. He is a parent himself.
Alas, we were given a date in September – which would have meant there would be no chance for S (if we were to win!) to start at school for the new school year. However, through great skill, speed and knowledge of the system, Douglas managed to negotiate with the SENDIST an expedited date and we were given July 1st.
There is a considerable level of strain involved in the lead up to the hearing. It felt like the only date in our world at that time.
Douglas had asked us in advance to prepare a few words to say to the panel about S and also suggested we bring along a photograph of him. In every other way, the hearing was entirely led for us by Douglas. There were three areas of argument to our case:
1. an appropriate peer group;
2. proper provision of fully integrated therapies (speech and language, occupational therapy and sensory integration therapy) delivered by trained, on-staff therapists; and
3. a waking day curriculum (residential).
We were represented by Douglas, the educational psychologist and the lead speech and language therapist from St Mary’s school. Southwark were represented by their solicitor and the headteacher of their named school (neither of whom had ever met S). The panel was made up of 3 members.
It was a highly charged and emotional day. We arrived at 9am and left at 3.30 (with a break for lunch). We felt that it had gone quite well, (given that our LEA had not assessed S and had provided no new evidence), but were well aware that it is impossible to tell and in any case were terrified of feeling too positive.
The two week wait for the outcome seemed like the longest time in the world. Just as soon as he’d received notification of the result, Douglas called us. ”You’ve won!!”, were the glorious words. I think, only then did we realise what a strain we’d been under.
In actual fact, we only won by default. Of our 3 areas of argument, the panel had agreed that the LEA school could not provide the first two, however they did not feel that S required a waking day curriculum. The fact that our preferred school was too far to travel to on a daily basis, and the LEA hadn’t suggested any other school, meant that the LEA had to name St Mary’s as S’s placement. But by whatever means, win we did, which meant S’s future could begin.
We were advised at the start of this process by our local Parent Partnership organisation that ‘the SENDIST don’t like it if you take along your own solicitor’. This statement keeps ringing in my ears as quite the most terrible piece of advice. There is no way at all that we could have won this case without Douglas representing us. The level of legal knowledge required in a very specialised area, with LEAs bent on putting up as many barriers as possible, is quite breathtaking. We have no doubt whatever, that we would not have won without him.
As I said, without Douglas’ help, we feel that S wouldn’t be in the position he is now, which is somewhere where we feel that he has a very real and promising future. He has now been at St Mary’s for one term and is positively flourishing.
Douglas is someone who we would unreservedly recommend to anyone needing legal help with a child with special needs.
We cannot thank him enough."
- Click here to read the SENDIST decision in this case
