The Tribunal had found that the child needed ‘a clear and consistent approach throughout his waking day’. However, it did not identify the educational need which required a placement in a residential school and it did not spell out what it considered that he needed in terms of educational provision outside of the normal school day. The need for consistency is not to be equated with a need for educational provision outside of normal school hours: see R (Tottman) v. Hertfordshire County Council ...
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Jurisdiction to hear parental appeal against an amendment or a determination to cease to maintain a statement of special educational needs. The case concerned the question as to whether the Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal had jurisdiction to hear an appeal by a parent in respect of the failure by her Local Education Authority to maintain a statement of Special Educational Needs for her son and to direct the LEA that they should continue to maintain a statement. The child in ...
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Supplementing of Decision Letters. Where, in the case of a 15 year old pupil with Asperger’s Syndrome, the written decision of an independent appeal panel upholding his permanent exclusion for assaulting a teacher had failed to address the questions required by the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 as amended, that failure was so fundamental that it could not be appropriate to permit the decision letter to be supplemented by later evidence as to the panel’s reasoning process. The decision w ...
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Failure to deliver a statement of case. A Tribunal had not erred in deciding to proceed with an appeal without input from a local education authority where that authority had failed to file a statement of case within the case statement period even though the effect of the decision was to exclude potentially relevant evidence. Regulation 15(1) of the Special Educational Needs Tribunal Regulations 2001 SI 2001 No 600 was mandatory. It was not permissive. The power to grant an extension of time w ...
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Free School Transport and Parental Choice of Schools. Where the parents’ preferred school is further away from the child’s home than another school or group of schools that can meet the child’s special educational needs and the LEA decides to name, in Part 4 of the child’s statement of special educational needs, the parents’ preferred school on condition that the parents agree to meet all or part of the transport costs, the LEA must ensure that it identifies, by name, the nearer appropriate sch ...
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The Tribunal had erred by failing to provide reasoned conclusions relating to expert evidence in favour of a residential placement at an independent special school. The Tribunal’s conclusions stated that the central question for the Tribunal was whether the day special school maintained by the local education authority could provide the education which the child in question required without the need for a residential placement at an independent special school. The Tribunal went on to answer t ...
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Special educational provision. Where it is necessary for a local education authority to make and maintain a statement of a child’s special educational needs, its obligation under section 324(3)(b) of the Education Act 1996 to specify the special educational provision to be made for the purpose of meeting those needs shall be satisfied where it specifies the provision that is “reasonably required” to meet those needs. It is pre-eminently a matter for the expert judgment of the Special Educationa ...
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