POSTBAG
SEN ASSESSMENT DELAY UNACCEPTABLE
SIX INTO THREE WON’T GO
I HAVE recently moved on assignment assessment process after every move. from Gibraltar to London, accompanied. There is an opportunity here for the In Gibraltar, my eight-year-old son was Armed Forces, advised by the families diagnosed with autism and measures were federations and the Children’s Education put in place to meet his special educational Advisory Service, to engage with local needs (SEN). In the UK, he could not be government to ensure that our children’s admitted to a suitable school without an needs are met as quickly as possible on Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP). moving between council areas. Five months after my assignment our Name and address supplied council has only now begun the statutory assessment process for him, which will Response from AFF Covenant Liaison, Kate take a further 20 weeks. McCullough: AFF is aware of a number of By the time provisions are put in place cases where families returning to the UK my son will have missed a whole year of after a posting overseas have had problems appropriate education. accessing appropriate support for their I believe my son is paying an unfair children with SEN. penalty for my being in the Army. Inherent in these issues is the The spirit of the Armed inconsistent ways in which Forces Covenant requires educational needs are that councils take assessed across the UK I believe my reasonable measures to and overseas. At the recent son is paying an avoid Service families Community Covenant unfair penalty for being disadvantaged. conferences, the MOD’s my being in In my son’s case the Directorate Children & the Army council could have done Young People acknowledged better. It could have accepted that this can create a vacuum reports from health and education in a child’s education whilst the professionals in Gibraltar and it could have problems associated with the lack of a begun the assessment process as soon as I universal EHCP are resolved. informed them of my assignment. AFF believes that this is a Covenant issue: My remaining concern is that when we the children at the centre of these cases are move at the end of my current assignment being poorly served by the lengthy EHCP we will have to go through the same assessment system through no fault of their process again. This would mean that my own and their education is being put at risk. son will only be properly educated on Every effort must be made to remove alternate years. the disadvantages they face due to their I suspect there are other families in our mobility and, as appropriate, guidance position. Children with special educational may need to be put in place. We would needs will not have an EHCP when moving encourage families to contact CEAS at back from an overseas assignment. enquiries@ceas.uk.com for advice as soon For assignments within the UK, children as possible to ensure the correct paperwork will need to go through the lengthy is in place.
MY husband applied for Service Families Accommodation (SFA) in Leuchars after he got his assignment order. After not hearing anything from the allocations office I went to our welfare office at Weeton Barracks. Our housing officer called them to discuss our application. We required a four-bedroom property as we have four kids, two living with us full-time and two from a previous relationship that live with us at weekends and school holidays. Our housing officer was advised that we were entitled to a four-bedroom quarter and that I would hear back within 15 working days. When our 15 days were up and we still hadn’t heard anything, I queried it only to find that we weren’t entitled and our application had been rejected. I suffer from anxiety attacks and I think that offering our family a three-bedroom property that will be too small, four weeks before our move is unsatisfactory. We have already informed our daughter that she would have her own bedroom; I now need to tell her that she won’t be able to stay with us. Our sons can share a room, but my daughter needs her own space. My husband and I are very distressed by this. Name and address supplied
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Response from Jayne Smith, DIO Service Delivery Accommodation: DIO and CarillionAmey provide Service accommodation in line with MOD policy, including the Personal Status Category, which, along with information such as competing requirements from other families, determines the allocation of SFA. I cannot comment without knowing more details. If the family wish to raise a complaint through the correct process, this matter can be fully investigated.
CHEAP UPGRADES NOT GOOD ENOUGH I LIVE on a modern military housing patch, so I am astounded by the number of people who have experienced problems with boilers in their Army quarter recently. On our local Facebook page, 13 families responded to a post complaining about broken boilers. Each of them had been without hot water and heating for days and sometimes even weeks on end in the middle of winter. The problems seem to be continually patched up rather than actually fixed, resulting in repeated call outs and huge frustration for the families.
DIO promised there would be money for upgrades in the coming years and that every MOD property will reach the decent homes standard by 2019. Army families certainly deserve to live in decent homes, so I hope that DIO don’t waste the money this time by building everything on the cheap. Name and address supplied Response from Jayne Smith, DIO Service Delivery Accommodation: A large number of Service homes have received significant funding in recent years, and many families have seen a vast improvement
in their living standards as a result. We are aware there is more we could do to improve SFA, but this is dependent on available funding. The maintenance service contract prioritises repairs based on the nature of the fault – full details are available in your guide to living in SFA booklet. DIO monitors statistics to ensure that our maintenance contractor is meeting its targets. If after checking against the standards families think repairs are taking longer than they should, call the CarillionAmey Helpdesk (0800 707 6000) to check progress.
GET INVOLVED: If you’ve experienced repeated problems with your SFA boiler, please fill out AFF’s survey at aff.org.uk www.armyandyou.co.uk
summer 2015 Army&You 57