Published on 12, July, 2020
This is my first post please be kind my punctuation and spelling is not great
My husband and I have just received penalty notices for my 12 year old ASD son as we took him on holiday during term time my son can not deal with crowded places and lots of over excited children we obviously want our son to experience every opportunity we can give him but find if we take him away during school holidays it is too stressful and overwhelming for him so we have no choice but to take him during school term time when it is quieter and he can enjoy his break away. My son is in mainstream school and the school are well aware of why we take him away during term time. Has anyone else had this issue and is there anything we can do about the penalty notice as it states we have no statutory right to appeal but feel there is exceptional circumstances for the leave
Hi. I think its disgraceful that parents of special needs children get penalties for taking their children out of school to go on holiday. Its a lack of understanding and I feel its just another way of local authorities making money out of people.
I think policies should be changed to take this into account. I have taken my son away in school holidays but he really struggles too as everywhere is busy and a lot of waiting is required which he struggles to do. When we went to a theme park in Spain other kids were climbing under and over barriers to get into the queues first which pushed us even further back. It was just too stressful for all of us.
I would say you have exceptional circumstances to appeal but whether you get anywhere is another matter. I have battles with my local authority all the time as I have to fight to get any help and support from them.
Best of luck. I hope you get the penalty overturned. Xx
Thankyou
we have contacted the local authority that the fine came from but have had no reply or acknowledgement from them we have been adviced from people we know to contact our local mp as he is very good when it comes to disabilities etc so we emailed him yesterday we have also contacted our local Sen iass but again have had nothing back it is looking like we will end up paying this fine as we can’t afford to wait till after the date it doubles £120 is bad enough if we don’t pay and it goes to court we just can’t afford the money we will have to pay if we lose. We are also looking into changing our sons school as they have been promising us for 2 years now to apply for his ehcp and additional funding and still have not done it keep coming up with different excuses we want to send him to a special Sen school that would understand his needs so much more but can’t do this until we have the ehcp in place so in the meantime while we wait for them to do what they have promised my son is suffering :(
Oh my gosh, that school sounds horrendous, get your son out ASAP!! They are not meeting his needs for sure!!
It's a shame about the fine but by the sounds of it it's the type of thing that school do.
I wish your family and especially your son luck for the future, don't give up, not all schools are bad
Kez x