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Another Issue in the long list of things that were wrong with Alfie’s appeal.
We would never have spotted this. The issue was uncovered by the education solicitors who were instructed at the time.
Newport City Council vigorously opposed Alfie’s appeal on the grounds of overcrowding in the communal arrears of the school. Apparently, admitting the last in catchment pupil would have caused significant prejudice to the school because of pressure on the communal arears.
The local authority, to support their case at appeal, provided the appeal panel with figures to show the capacity of the school. The figures indicate the school population’s use of the communal arears. The local authority only provided the appeal panel with the figures for years 7 -11. These figures are incomplete and provide an inaccurate analysis of the alleged overcrowding; the appeal panel should have been given the full figures for years 7-13.
Providing inaccurate figures in this way mislead the appeal panel into believing that there was less capacity than there really was.
Newport City Council admitted on 10.06.21 that they had excluded the year 12 and 13 figures in their submissions but claimed that the correct figures including years 12 and 13 had also been given to panel in a separate document.
It is absolutely clear however from the appeal Decision Notice that the appeal panel relied on the incorrect figure. The incorrect figure understated the capacity of the school. Capacity is the ground on which Alfie was excluded. Alfie lost his appeal 2:1. It is at the very least possible that the outcome would have been different if the Appeal Panel had had the correct information.
You would have thought that the child should certainly be given the benefit of the very significant doubt in this case and the appeal re-run fairly and with the correct information. The point was raised with Newport City Council. For reasons I do not begin to understand, they don’t appear to think this is an issue.
Update
As previously reported, we went to see Ruth Jones MP on the 11.10.21. Ruth is Alfie’s Westminster MP. Education is devolved in Wales but unfortunately, Alfie’s constituency member of the Welsh parliament has taken little interest. Ruth has had no luck with Newport City Council (who are the local education authority) and is still awaiting a substantive response from the Welsh education minister, Jeremy Miles. We are very grateful to Ruth for taking an interest even though education is devolved to Wales.
We are awaiting the results of Freedom of Information requests from the Newport City Council. The statutory deadline for the Freedom of Information request is the 09.12.21, I wonder if they will meet their statutory obligations and how open they are going to be?
Background
Alfie was the only in catchment year 6 pupil, out of 291, to be declined a place at his local comprehensive. The local authority proposed to taxi him right across the city every day to a distant school. He was first on the waiting list, but since then he has been pushed back around a dozen times by late applicants or out of catchment children who have been given places ahead of him.
Alfie appealed but lost his appeal 2:1. A frankly shocking list of issues with the appeal have come to light, but the local education authority is refusing to accept any of these issues are a problem.
More here https://chng.it/WtL2jZMV
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