Mother confronts minister over autistic daughter's schooling

Marie Gillam now home-schools her daughter Jessica

The mother of an autistic girl has confronted Scotland's education secretary about how her daughter was treated in school.

Marie Gillam said her daughter Jessica had been left dirty after she was not given assistance using the toilet.

During a BBC Radio Scotland phone-in, she told John Swinney that children with additional support needs were "really being failed".

Mr Swinney said the circumstances as described were "totally unacceptable".

The city council in Edinburgh, where Jessica was at school, said it took the concerns raised "very seriously" and was investigating them.

• Swinney defends tests for P1 pupils

Mr Swinney was taking part in a BBC Radio Scotland phone-in about education, fielding questions on topics including assessments for P1 pupils and teacher recruitment.

Mrs Gillam told the minister that she had had to start home-schooling her daughter Jessica, who was diagnosed as autistic aged two, because "she really couldn't cope in mainstream school whatsoever".

She said: "She had a learning assistant because she can't get dressed or undressed herself, she can't go to the toilet unaided or clean herself.

"On one particular day her learning assistant wasn't around so they asked her 10-year-old twin sister to take her to the toilet and help.

"When I picked them up from school Jessica was dirty right up her back and down her thighs, and her twin sister was quite upset that she couldn't help her.

"I contacted the school about that, and they said that if it was any consolation, the teacher who was sat with her for the rest of the afternoon couldn't smell it."

Mrs Gillam told the education secretary that children with additional support needs were "really being failed"

Mrs Gillam later told BBC Scotland that on several occasions other teachers had told Jessica that "a child her age should be able to get dressed themselves".

She added: "On another occasion, for PE, a supply teacher left her in the changing rooms and her twin sister had to change her for PE, and then change her back into her school stuff.

"The supply teacher had popped her head around the door and given them a row for taking too long, and actually just left them there and went back to class."

Mrs Gillam said Jessica "became very upset and very violent" when she tried to take her to school, to the point where "we just physically couldn't get her there". She is now home-schooled.

She said that the 11-year-old "just shakes whenever she goes near a school", and has "really lost trust in adults she doesn't know".

John Swinney was taking part in a BBC Radio Scotland phone-in

Mr Swinney said the situation described to him by Mrs Gillam was "totally unacceptable".

He said: "Our education system operates on the founding principle that we have to get it right for every child, that the arrangements have to be put in place to safely support and educate every young person, and their particular needs have to be met.

"Obviously, local authorities have to make the assessment about how to fulfil the needs of individual children, but what you've recounted to me there is clearly unacceptable.

"If Marie will get in touch with my office I will very much look at the specific case that she has put to me, because certainly the needs of every child have to be identified and met, and I'd want to make sure that is the case."

There have previously been warnings about the continuing ability to teach children with additional support needs in mainstream schools, with the EIS union saying there had been cuts to staffing and resources for specialist teachers.

Scottish Labour said that the number of additional support-needs teachers and other support staff was "not keeping pace with pupil numbers".

The party's education spokesman Iain Gray said Mrs Gillam's story would "horrify people across Scotland", and hoped that it would "finally shake the SNP into action to deliver the funding our schools need".

Mrs Gillam said she was hopeful Mr Swinney would help, but said she would not hold her breath.

She added: "The fact there are so many children with additional support needs being let down, something needs done - and he's the man in the position to do that, to help."

A spokeswoman for City of Edinburgh Council said: "We take the concerns raised by the family very seriously and are investigating them."