Dear James,
It is time for the buck to stop. You are the one who, last May, suggested that Daniel would fare better in a more specialist educational environment, yet you neglected to issue a Proposed Amended EHCP until I had raised my complaint to level 2 late last year.
You are the one who failed to return my calls and emails last September and then allowed funding to be released for A2E, which is not a suitable interim measure and is nowhere near anything resembling education or access thereto. You are the one who has allowed the rebuffs of schools who say they have a pupil similar and therefore cannot have Daniel, and those who claim they can’t “meet need” because they feel placing Daniel might compromise the education of others at that school. You are the one who has not gone back, time and again, to argue for the legal right to an education for my son.
You are the one also, who sent in a mainstream tutor only after I lodged my level 2 complaint, and who said, when the tutor wrought havoc in the household of a vulnerable child, that I should be the one to complain to the company direct. You are the one who originated this entire situation: you recommended a change of school and then failed to find my son a school; Cranmere let Daniel leave on the assumption that you would do what you are employed to do. You have not.
I am calling an Emergency Annual Review of my son’s case, and I want you to understand that, when I say that this situation is your doing, and you say, “I rebuff that” that the facts speak for themselves. You have made this statement twice. Let me clarify the meaning of the word ‘rebuff’: it is in fact a rejection, a repulse or a snub. “Snub: rebuff or humiliate with sharp words or a marked lack of cordiality” (Concise Oxford Dictionary, 1990). This is significant of the lack of respect with which my son and myself have been treated. You refer to my son in emails as a collection of initials: DPS. His name is Daniel, and he is a brilliant boy with massive potential, and it is you, James, who are rubbing away at his chances not simply of achieving his potential in education, but in life as a whole as he grows older.
My mother and I have spent over £7,000.00 on childcare since September and I have given up my training. I am instead on increased medication and fighting to keep my head above water, while you remain in a job for which you are woefully unsuitable.
I want the Emergency Annual Review as soon as possible, and you can be sure that I will make you take responsibility for this.
Sincerely,
Rachael Pinder
ASD: on being a special-needs single parent 