Administrative Justice and Tribunals Council ... - Consultation Hub

Currently the Local Government Ombudsman (LGO) investigates parental complaints
regarding the admission and exclusion appeals process for schools, other than
Academies. (Academies complaints are overseen by the DfE Secretary of State)
It is notable that the majority of the LGO’s reports of maladministration involve schools
that are their own admission authority, as their panels are not always fully aware of the
need to follow the Codes or, if they are, they do not appear to consider they should do
so. Therefore, when the majority of schools become responsible for their own appeal
process, the supervisory function of the Council will be even more necessary!
Consequently the small team of civil servants in MOJ cannot possibly be adequately
resourced to respond to the significant increase in the number of panels that will need
to be inspected and supervised.
Consultation
While it is noted, in paragraph 34 of the Consultation document, that the Administrative
Justice team within the MOJ is committed to working closely and proactively with other
Government departments to ensure a coherent and consistent approach to
administrative justice policy, including the identification of potential improvements to
the user experience, that team cannot possibly and will not have the depth of
experience and knowledge which the AJTC has gained over the last 30 years in
respect of the education legislation i.e. since 1980.
Indeed, if is the intention that the MOJ team’s task in this respect will not include
comments on the specific area of law on admissions and exclusions, again there will
be a significant reduction in the function currently carried out by the AJTC. This will
result in a detrimental impact on both the work of the panels and, ultimately, the
parents/guardians and children involved in the school admissions and exclusions
processes.
While school exclusion appeal panels hear approximately 1000 cases a year, school
admission panels alone heard 60,855 cases in 2009/10 and 63,715 in 2008/09,
although the number of admission appeal hearings is slightly lower than the number of
cases as they are grouped together when possible. Therefore, these panels deal with
a very large number of citizens regarding their children in what is a high profile area of
work.
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