Council wins appeal on golf lessons for special needs pupil
A JUDGE has upheld an appeal by a council which challenged paying for golf coaching and gym training for a teenager with special educational needs.
It came after East Riding Council appealed a first-tier tribunal decision to include a number of hours a week of golf coaching and gym training in the 18-year-old's legally-binding Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP).
Judge Zachary Citron, sitting in the Upper Tribunal Administrative Appeals Chamber, found that the inclusion of golf and gym provision in the talented golfer’s EHCP was "an error on a point of law" and sent the case to a fresh tribunal “for reconsideration”.
The teenager, who has a “severe language disorder”, had been having online tuition paid for by her parents. They were also paying for her golf tuition, club membership and competition entry fees. Her ambition is to be a professional golfer, court documents added.
The original decision allowed her “a package of support that can meet (her) needs and career aspirations, to include: golf coaching, golf practice, gym programme with personal trainer oversight and membership, and golf club membership”, but excluded competition fees and associated travel costs. It determined that she should spend 11 hours a week on maths and English and 11-and-a-half on golf and the gym.
The council appealed on the basis that the golf and gym provision was “incapable of amounting to special educational provision".
Judge Citron said the tribunal hadn't explained why her special educational needs required golf and gym provision when this catered to her areas of strength. He added: "I would go further and say that no reasonable tribunal, on the facts of this case, could rationally have decided that (her) special educational needs...called for, or required, the golf and gym provision. “
The connection, he said, is “simply too tenuous." He said a fresh tribunal was best placed to take a holistic view of what special educational provision is called for.