School Adjudicator Finds Against NCC Policy

Fairness4siblings welcome the decision by the School Adjudicator that has ruled, removing priority for children living out of catchment with an elder already at a school, is unfair and therefore unlawful under Section 14 of the School Admissions Code. Mounting this appeal was a process one of our members put a significant amount of research and input to. Paragraph 14 of the school admissions code relates to the overall principle of fairness that underpins the lawfulness of school admissions arrangements and a breach of this is a significant issue and one we feel makes the admission arrangements unlawful. Although this is a victory for common sense it is still tinged with the fact that there are hundreds of families from 2016 still suffering emotional, financial and logistical hardships as a result of the change. An issue allured to by the adjudicator in his determination. NCC’s acknowledgement that families face disappointment, anxiety and frustration falls well short of describing the real impact. The adjudicator has made it clear that the previous sibling criteria in use by NCC was fair and sees no justifiable reason for removing it. Although the decision relates to one School within the NCC area it regards a criteria which is in use by the majority of NCC Authority maintained Primary Schools. We eagerly await NCC’s actions in relation to this. Fairness4Sliblings will challenge anything short of a complete reversal and another meeting with the officers from NCC has been urgently requested. Many have noticed there appears to be an underlying theme running throughout the adjudicator’s findings that NCC’s response to the adjudication process appears far from a full and open engagement. Wording of the document conveys a level of frustration by the adjudicator. This frustration is felt by many parents in their dealings with the NCC admissions team. The response by Marion Clay, NCC that the decision by the adjudicator confirms the approach taken by her and her team in setting the admission arrangements was Lawful and reasonable somewhat beggar’s belief. Misinterpretation and misrepresentation to us seems a common issue within the department. Many hundreds of parents who have applied for September 2017 places will of course be disappointed that the adjudicator’s decision came too late for them. In our opinion delays by the admission department during the adjudication by significantly extending 7 day response periods and failing to answer relevant points may have contributed to this. We are particularly dismayed that on 21st October 2016 the adjudicator made it clear to the authority that he was of the opinion then that the criteria may not be fair. In conjunction with this Fairness4siblings had requested the authority apply for an in year variation for 2017/2018 applications to the published criteria to protect those with a sibling already at the school. The failure of the authority to act on these means hundreds more families are faced with the same trauma as those who were affected in 2016. Although the adjudication prevents a change to the 2017 criteria it does not prevent the authority from taking steps to identify mutually convenient swaps (for either intake year) or possibly after allocating all catchment places, creating a waiting list for all other remaining places and applying a sibling priority. Fairness4siblings feel the authority has a moral and possibly legal duty to make all effort to cater for those it has wronged. A Common law general duty of fairness applies. We were rather hoping that there would be no requirement for the Fairness4siblings campaign to continue but we and many other parents have no faith in the NCC admissions team. It appears to be a dysfunctional department, where honesty integrity and openness is questionable. We call for a full independent enquiry into the handling of the criteria change and independent monitoring of any 2017 appeals. We as a group are preparing to assist the many parents who will need support in the months to come.