Northamptonshire mum forced to quit job at council as child, nine, has no school place after nearly a year

The nine-year-old has gone without a school place for almost a whole year.

“I really felt like a door was slammed in my face,” Shan Reid told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).

She says her daughter, who is autistic, has still not been placed on a school roll and is only receiving four hours of tuition a week, despite moving to the county last summer. She claims that North Northamptonshire Council (NNC) has not been in contact about a school placement for several months and has failed to secure an option for her child.

A NNC spokesperson said the authority is not able to comment on the circumstances of specific individuals for confidentiality reasons.

‘We’ve come here and they’ve provided us with nothing’

Ms Reid said: “[The tutoring is] just not enough because she was used to going to mainstream school and autistic children need a routine. We’ve come here and they’ve provided us with nothing. I don’t have anybody who I can lean on or any professional to come in and say what she needs.

“I don’t think they understand the effect that it’s going to have and how traumatising it is going to be for her. It’s affecting my mental health, it’s obviously affecting her mental health and her behaviour.

“I just feel like I’ve come here and she’s just failing.”

The mother told the LDRS that her daughter’s previous local authority offered a speech therapist, educational consultant, and SENCO team to support her learning. She said the mainstream setting was still not enough for her day-to-day needs.

She said that her initial requests to NNC for a special school placement for her daughter were rejected. She added that the inability of the council to find a school place that was equipped to teach her should be enough evidence in itself that she needs specialist provision.

Since moving to North Northants, Ms Reid has said that all of the support her child used to get has slipped away. She also said her daughter’s lack of interactions with other children since moving to the area was a major concern.

“We’d moved to a brand new place, we didn’t know anybody, so she’s not interacting with anybody her age,” the mother told the LDRS.

“I’m having to use my money to get her to extracurricular activities like swimming, martial arts, SEN clubs. It’s hard because there’s not much to do, it feels like everything out there is for children who are considered ‘normal’.

“I want her to be able to be around other children.”

‘A lack of support for SEN children and their parents’

She says the lack of support hurts even more, given her previous job as a family hub connector for the council. Ms Reid said she avoided bringing her personal life into work, but eventually emailed the head of NNC’s SEND services about her experience after realising she would have to step back from her role to care for her daughter.

She said she never received a reply.

Ms Reid explained: “I was working and was helping also in children’s services, trying to help families who are in similar positions such as myself. I was so frustrated because I was thinking I actually like the job, but I’m going to have to leave because I have no one to look after my daughter.

“I’m trying to advocate and promote all of these services for North Northamptonshire Council only for my own child not to be getting that.

“I think there’s been a lack of support for SEN children and their parents. We need support. It’s already difficult for us on a day-to-day basis, dealing with our children and their mood swings, their wellbeing, their mental health.

“I just want her to be able to attend a school that will actually support her and be there for her and provide the right resources and materials.

“To me, it feels a bit like ‘these children are unable to do certain things in life, so allow them to fail because they’re already going to fail’. I want for us parents to stick together and for our voices to be heard because our children matter.”

A spokesperson stated: “ North Northamptonshire Council welcomes feedback across all services and has a robust complaints process in place.

“Further details about how to submit a complaint can be found on the council’s website. The council works hard to ensure that all formal complaints, as well as informal feedback, is responded to appropriately and in a timely manner.

“Unfortunately, we are unable to comment on the circumstances of specific individuals for reasons of confidentiality”.