Children with special needs are overlooked

12:57pm Thursday 15th May 2008

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• WILTSHIRE County Council claimed in the Journal that changes have been made to ensure better communication between social services and education when they failed an autistic girl and her family.

My daughter has special education needs and the LEA have decided that she should attend the local secondary school against our advice.

While we have been told that she requires a special needs school, her teachers are not allowed to state this in any of their reports.

Apparently, employees of Wiltshire County Council are not allowed to do this and their jobs are in jeopardy if they do so.

Until this policy is changed many parents face the expensive task of going to a special educational needs tribunal to get the education their child deserves and there will be many stories similar to last weeks reported for years to come.

NAME AND ADDRESS SUPPLIED

• I WONDER if other readers of the Journal noticed thedisgusting irony in a recent edition.

On page 7 there was the shocking story of Ashley Jones, a heavily disabled young man who Wiltshire County Council are forcing out of education by making him pay for his school bus.

Then, on page 6, there was an advert by WiltshireCounty Council with the headline "All our children are different, allour children are special".

I was utterly disgusted by the insensitivity of this.

If all our children are special why will the County Council not enable Ashley to attend school?

They should be ashamed of this hypocrisy and the sickening decision to charge disabled children for transport to and from school.

NICK RADFORD
Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Spokesman for Salisbury