Decision report 201200170

Summary

An advocacy worker (Ms C) complained on behalf of Mr and Mrs A about the special school attended by their son (Master A). Following an episode of challenging behaviour, the school requested that he be collected and taken home. She said that when he was picked up, he reported that he was sore, and was later found to have unexplained bruising to his body. Ms C made six complaints about this.

We upheld three of Ms C's complaints. Our investigation found no evidence that the school had unreasonably physically restrained Master A. Nor did we find evidence that the school had not provided one-to-one support, as we could find no consistent record of their having agreed to do so. We did, however, find significant shortcomings in the school's record-keeping in relation to the incident and also of meetings where Master A's needs were discussed. We did not uphold the complaint that his teacher did not have sufficient training or experience.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• apologise for the failure to keep accurate and consistent records of meetings.