A family has been awarded compensation and an apology after a mother took a complaint about her son’s secondary school allocation to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.
The mother, who is unnamed and referred to as Dr X in the ombudsman’s report, was awarded £250 in compensation from Brighton and Hove City Council to acknowledge her “distress, frustration and uncertainty” over the way her son was allocated a place at secondary school.
In her complaint, Dr X said that the council used the order in which parents applied for places for their children to secondary school in September 2021 as a selection criterion when they increased the number of places offered at oversubscribed schools.
Dr X said that this caused an injustice because her son was potentially denied a place at one of his preferred schools.
She said that she applied for three schools, referred to as A, B and C, believed to be Varndean, the Brighton Aldridge Community Academy (BACA) and Dorothy Stringer respectively.
She was living in the catchment area for A and C – both oversubscribed – and her son was given a place at school B which was further away.
An extra 29 places were made available at schools A and C and Dr X was concerned that her son was not included in the ballot because he had been offered a place at his second-choice school.
Dr X said that the council had applied a “first preference first” policy which was banned by the School Admissions Code 2021.
She claimed that the council had not followed its published admission arrangements. Instead, it had applied unpublished criteria that she and others were unaware of. Had she been aware of this, she may have chosen different preferences.
Dr X appealed against the council’s school allocation decision but was unsuccessful so took her case to the ombudsman.
The council said that it used an equal preference system and as Dr X’s son had been allocated the second preference school, he was not considered for the third preference.
The ombudsman’s investigator found fault with the council and the appeals panel. The investigator, who was also unnamed, said: “The council says its oversubscription criteria were contained within its published admission arrangements. I disagree.
“Information about what would happen in this type of situation where a PAN (published admissions number) was temporarily increased was not available to parents.
“I am satisfied the council allocated places using unpublished admission criteria.
“The code states that in the event of oversubscription, the council must ‘set out clearly how this will operate, ensuring that arrangements are transparent’.
“The council effectively added an extra stage in the ballot process by taking account of preferences.
“I appreciate it was the pragmatic solution but it was not published and it should have been. This was a fault.”
The council agreed to apologise to Dr X and pay £250 to acknowledge her distress, frustration and uncertainty.
The council must also review the use and publication of its oversubscription criteria and provide all members of the appeal panel and clerks with copies of the ombudsman’s decision.
The council said: “We have noted the decision of the ombudsman and are reviewing our oversubscription criteria for secondary school admissions as the ombudsman has asked us to do.”
