Anyone used the LGO yet???

[Sally44]

I've today spoken with the LGO about non-compliance issues relating to my son's statement. They've assured me that they will forward my complaint and that someone will phone me back and speak to me BEFORE they start contacting the school/LEA.

I've already been through the AR recently and the LEA have now said they want to do a re-assessment from the beginning. The SALT has already told me she does not intend to any further assessments as she did them all for the AR. And I am happy with her report (although not all her recommendations because she is trying to reduce input).

The inclusion officer phoned me today and said they wanted the EP and medical advice (I presume from the paediatrician that initially diagnosed). However the fact the EP is being asked to do an up to date reports proves in itself that that is non-compliance because the Statement clearly says they should monitor the effectiveness of programmes and make adjustments. It also stated they should ascertain if he has a dyslexia and should identify how to move his skills on. This hasn't happened.

I haven't heard from the LEA yet about my letter of non-compliance. It will be a week on Friday.

Although the LGO is a route parents can take, I have never used them before. I am all too aware of being the parental pain in the ass. However I cannot see any other way of doing it, because it has got beyond a joke.

AND as there is going to be a total re-assessment anyway, is the LGO getting involved going to make things better or worse. As they now have new jurisdiction (they can investigate schools as well as LEAs), the woman I spoke too did not seem very clear on what they could or could not do depending on 'when' the new jurisdiction came into place. So I'm rather confused.

It is all well and good there being these 'systems' in place. But I am finding they mean diddly squat unless you are prepared to challenge the LEA on the fact that they are not complying.

Has anyone used them yet, and were they any good or were they as useful as a chocolate teapot? I don't even know what powers they have to force a school or LEA to provide what is in the Statement.

[Kathryn]

I doubt whether anyone has been down this route yet. This is all new to the LGO too and I gather they are being hurriedly trained and bracing themselves for a deluge of complaints following the recent widening of their powers. I'll be interested to hear how it all goes Sally, you can be a pioneer!

 

K x

[bensmum2]

Hi i have had a complaint in with the LGO since lasy May when my son had been too ill to attend school for over 5 months and they refused to provide any llternative and instead threatened us with child protection, so far they have nothing NOTHING, the LEA replied to my complaint with lot of lies and i had to defend myself against all these, i was in regular contact wiht the LGO for months and she was very nice, but as time went on my complaint grew and they will still only deal with the original issue even though so much worse ahs happened since then. They even asked me how the teachers were supposed to recognise my sons aspergers even though the psychologists misdiagnosed, but as i said to them the teachers saw him every day and are supposed to be trained, and if they ahd taken notice of me they woudl have clearly seen what his problems were. They promised about 3 months ago to finalise this case now and i have asked for compensation for the schooling i have had to pay for this year when i was forced to deregister him, they say that i'm unlikely to get anything. I haven't heard anything since, but basically they seem a total waste of time i went hthrough the councils own complaints system twice first as well .This was before the new powers though, but i can't see it being any different. Personally i would contact ipsea or ace and get their help instead , hope that helps , they dotn actually seem to ahve any powers to force anyone to do anything in my experience!!

[JsMum]

I am not sure what an LGO is, but I put in two Complaints in Js second primary school when his SENs where not met and he wasnt recieiving the support he should of been, It went as far as the chair of govuner and personaly it was swept under the carpet, I eventually moved him to another primary school where the HT tried to prevent a Taxi been paid to the new school and the report he did slandered me and lied too, I had to defend myself to the local authority Childrens Director and I got some reasurrance from him, but I felt terribly let down, the system is flawed to a certain extent, I felt it supported the Educational system rather than the child who needs the education and I have not gone down the Complaints route with Education since then which is good few years now, we are in pursuit with a complaint with social services but I think their teir system is fairer as if your not happy with tier one and two, it goes to independant, outside agencys which I think is what is needed in the Education system.

 

Is LGO similair for Education issues, is it an outside independant body that actually listens, and acts.

 

bensmum2 feel for you soo much, I really do hope that you get something sorted out soonx

 

JsMumxx

Edited March 25, 2010 by JsMum

[bensmum2]

J's mum, LGO is local governemnt ombudsman, school have told many lies in my case too, i was honest with them aty all times and ONE TIME ben was up all night and was really tired (coulnd't sleep for worrying about school) and i todl them, in their reports about why he was constantly sent hoem for no reason , they put he regualrly came in after being up all night and seemes ot ahve no routine t home, and even after being advised of his somatic illness relating to school befor he went into year 7, they alod put half way through year 8, Bne has complained of stomach pains this is the first we have heard of it!! I also complained to the social servicesa and my MP, both times my complaint was sent to the same woman i was complaining about to deal with and to this day she is still the boss and still the one refusing us help.bns final statement came yesterday and today we are being forced to look at a mainstream school with 800 pupils only 8 of which are asd, if he went there he woudl have to leave home at 7am walk 20 minutes into town, catch a bus to another town (20 mins away) then cath the school bus from there to arrive at school in time for an 8 20 start, i should also add that he is partially sighted and has severe anxiety!!! They are off their heads!! On a brighter note we have an asd awareness day locally today and i intend getting a lot of info regards trying to get help. x

[JsMum]

J's mum, LGO is local governemnt ombudsman, school have told many lies in my case too, i was honest with them aty all times and ONE TIME ben was up all night and was really tired (coulnd't sleep for worrying about school) and i todl them, in their reports about why he was constantly sent hoem for no reason , they put he regualrly came in after being up all night and seemes ot ahve no routine t home, and even after being advised of his somatic illness relating to school befor he went into year 7, they alod put half way through year 8, Bne has complained of stomach pains this is the first we have heard of it!! I also complained to the social servicesa and my MP, both times my complaint was sent to the same woman i was complaining about to deal with and to this day she is still the boss and still the one refusing us help.bns final statement came yesterday and today we are being forced to look at a mainstream school with 800 pupils only 8 of which are asd, if he went there he woudl have to leave home at 7am walk 20 minutes into town, catch a bus to another town (20 mins away) then cath the school bus from there to arrive at school in time for an 8 20 start, i should also add that he is partially sighted and has severe anxiety!!! They are off their heads!! On a brighter note we have an asd awareness day locally today and i intend getting a lot of info regards trying to get help. x

Then yes I went to LGO they found no administration errors the Chair of Gov said that J wasnt on the schools SEN register at the time which I told her was incorrect as he has been on SENs register since Nursery, he had several DX by then and he was regressing, anyway the COG wanted a recent social services report, of which she could access from his files, I sent it in but I got no reply, it wasnt much longer than that we placed him in another school, and he went with his new statement, the LEA tried to place J in a secondary mainstream school with over 2000 children and then a moderate learning difficulties school and he hasnt got MLDs, we eventually went to tribunal for the school he is in now.

 

Js still Anxious and still has his problems but he is progressing and they meet his needs and the most important is the school and I communicate regularly to keep the little things becoming big things.

 

Request the school you want, also reguaring travel you can request that he is tranported as he is not safe on public transport and will cause him too much stress and anxiety which will result in attendance issues.

 

IPSEa/NAS/Conact a family can help you go throw the process of appealing the statement if you want to change parts of it and include things like transport.

 

Good luck, Ive been were you are now but with the right enviroement your lad can succeed and show his true potential.

 

JsMumxxx

 

 

[Sally44]

It does seem to me that unless you have a very specific identifiable complaint that it is going to get bogged down in interpretation and heresay.

One part of the complaint is that his Statement says "An OT will draft a suitable programme which will be delivered by school staff and monitored on a termly basis by the OT." That hasn't happened. The OT report says he has received nothing since July 2009. So I am interested to see what they say about that.

One other part is that my son's Statement says he should receive "an individualised multi sensory literacy programme". He receives phonics. That is not individualised or multi sensory. But I can see this is down to interpretation.

And at the end of it - what is going to be the benefit. If he is getting an OT programme great. But everyone involved with my son is going to feel very negative towards me especially, which may have an impact on how they treat him as well.

Another part says my son should receive the SCERTS programme. Everyone is agreed that this is going to happen. But we still have no date yet. It is now over a year. That surely is non-compliance.

[JsMum]

It does seem to me that unless you have a very specific identifiable complaint that it is going to get bogged down in interpretation and heresay.

One part of the complaint is that his Statement says "An OT will draft a suitable programme which will be delivered by school staff and monitored on a termly basis by the OT." That hasn't happened. The OT report says he has received nothing since July 2009. So I am interested to see what they say about that.

One other part is that my son's Statement says he should receive "an individualised multi sensory literacy programme". He receives phonics. That is not individualised or multi sensory. But I can see this is down to interpretation.

And at the end of it - what is going to be the benefit. If he is getting an OT programme great. But everyone involved with my son is going to feel very negative towards me especially, which may have an impact on how they treat him as well.

Another part says my son should receive the SCERTS programme. Everyone is agreed that this is going to happen. But we still have no date yet. It is now over a year. That surely is non-compliance.

I would say you have good grounds on your complaint, these to me look defo like administration and service provision, basically they havent obided to the statement, at anual review cant you appeal to tribunal again.

 

I wouldnt stay with a school that didnt obide by the statement.

 

JsMumxxx

 

[Sally44]

You can only appeal to tribunal at Annual Review IF the LEA amends the current Statement.

What the LEA have done is, rather than amend they have asked for a re-assessment from the beginning. So I have no immediate grounds to appeal, but I can still follow up the non-compliance on the current Statement UNTIL they produce a new Proposed Statement and finalise it.

I just wonder if all these non-compliance issues are relevent at Tribunal.

[JsMum]

You can only appeal to tribunal at Annual Review IF the LEA amends the current Statement.

What the LEA have done is, rather than amend they have asked for a re-assessment from the beginning. So I have no immediate grounds to appeal, but I can still follow up the non-compliance on the current Statement UNTIL they produce a new Proposed Statement and finalise it.

I just wonder if all these non-compliance issues are relevent at Tribunal.

if the school are not forfilling the statement I thought it did go back to tribunal and thats why you have a annual review, so when the new statement is issued you can appeal. Ive still got loads to learn, its mad, have you contacted IPSEA Im sure they will know, I remember in the early days, the Solisitor did not want me asking for a reassessment and she wanted the statement issued so we could appeal, which it did but we where asking for amendments, so understand where you coming throw but a statement is a legal binding and should be followed, Im sure tribunals deal with that also.

 

JsMumxxx

 

[JsMum]

Found this on ipsea, last section.

 

http://www.ipsea.org.uk/What-you-need-to-k...nImplementation

 

JsMumx

 

[JsMum]

Ive chatted to sendist and they said your right you go throw the LGO there is a website which Im sure you have but just posting incase others need it if their area local authority are not adering to statements.

 

http://www.lgo.org.uk/

 

It has recently changed the way that you complain about statements not been followed but its now the LGO.

 

So now at least I know that its not redirected back to sendist, sendist has had a few changes too so im only going by what I knew in the time when I went throw tribunal 2 yrs ago and complaints went to special education departments, but not anymore.

 

Sorry I was misleading you, but Im learning all the time too.

 

JsMumxx

x

Edited March 25, 2010 by JsMum