• home page
• about the firm
• press office
• contact us
• business sectors
• practice areas
• seminars
• publications
• recruitment
• trainees
• technology

• legal updates
• bulletins
• service overviews
• transaction updates
• consultation papers
• library
• podcasts
• join our mailing list

Fraudulent admissions

The issue of fraudulently obtained school places has received much recent media coverage.  First the Local Government Association (LGA) reported that the number of parents found to be lying on application forms was nine times higher in 2007/2008 than two years ago and nearly three times higher than last year. Then Poole Borough Council admitted to controversially using powers under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA) to investigate potentially fraudulent applications for school places. Poole said two offers of school places were withdrawn as a consequence of their surveillance.

However, much of the media coverage has been geared towards identifying fraudulent admissions prior to offers of places being taken up. The question of what schools are to do when a fraudulent admission comes to their notice at a later stage and after a child has taken up the school place, is more problematic. 

In terms of the Admissions Code of Practice 2007 paragraph, 1.44 states that “a school place must not be withdrawn once the child has started at the school, except where that place was fraudulently obtained.  In deciding whether to withdraw the place, the length of time that the child has been at the school must be taken into account.”

It follows, therefore, that in certain circumstances, it is permissible for a school place to be withdrawn after it has been taken up if it can be shown that that place was obtained fraudulently.  However, whether a school should in fact take this step will depend upon the length of time that the child has been at the school. In this respect the Code is unhelpful in that it does not provide any detailed guidance. Since both the Admissions Code of Practice and government guidance relating to exclusions make clear the importance of schools not penalising pupils for the bad behaviour of their parents, if removing a fraudulently obtained place would cause significant disruption to a pupil’s educational progress then it may be vulnerable to challenge.

Another area of interest to schools is whether a parent who has obtained a school place fraudulently has potentially commissioned a criminal offence. Where a suitable declaration is included in the school’s application form, a fraudulent application could be the basis of an action under the Perjury Act 1911. However, in the absence of this possibility, the parent’s actions would fall to be considered under either Section 1 of the Theft Act 1978, obtaining services by deception, or Section 2 of the Fraud Act 2006, fraud by false representation, depending on whether the application was made before or after 15 January 2007.

In the recent media publicity the LGA has promoted the view that parents who lie about where they live in order to get a place at a school risk prosecution under the Fraud Act 2006.  However we are not clear that the Fraud Act does, in fact, have application in the case of fraudulent school admissions. In order for Section 2 to be relevant, the parent will need to be shown to have intended a gain for himself or another in terms of money or other property.  Whether a state funded school place can be so characterised has not yet been tested in law.

For further information or advice, please contact Mark Blois.