A high-profile faith school won a High Court judicial review last month over the Schools Adjudicator’s finding that its admission arrangements for 2014 and 2015 were unlawful.
The London Oratory School is an extremely popular Catholic school that is vastly oversubscribed year on year.
By a determination on 15 July 2014 the Adjudicator, Dr Bryan Slater, ruled that the school had been in breach of its statutory obligations.
Among the breaches he found were the prioritisation of applications on the basis of practical or financial help to organisations associated with the school; admissions criteria that used participation in religious activities not as laid out by the relevant religious authority; and failing to allow admission of children of no faith.
Dr Slater also found the school used the wrong criteria to judge pupils' religious zeal when deciding between applications that exceeded the number of available places, and that it had an abnormally low proportion of non-white pupils for a school in inner London.
The London Oratory challenged that determination by way of judicial review.
In London Oratory School, R (on the application of) v The Schools Adjudicator & Anor [2015] EWHC 1155 (Admin) Mr Justice Cobb last month ruled that the claimants had succeeded in demonstrating that:
- The Adjudicator applied too stringent a test when concluding that the Governing Body of the School (as the relevant 'admission authority', per section 88 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998) had failed to 'have regard' to the published Guidance (2003) from the Archdiocese of Westminster (as it was required to do under the Department for Education's School Admissions Code (2012) ("the Admissions Code")) when setting its faith-based oversubscription criteria;
- The Adjudicator's conclusion that the Governing Body had operated an admissions system which was socially selective, discriminatory, and unfairly disadvantageous to children from "less well-off" families was flawed, and was reached by a process which was procedurally unfair to the school;
- The Adjudicator's conclusion that the admissions forms published by the Governing Body for 2015 were unclear in failing to identify what was meant by a 'parent' was Wednesbury unreasonable, failing to acknowledge (or even refer to) the relevant 'definition' section which appeared prominently in the notes to support the admissions process;
- That it was/would be permissible for the school to request parents' baptismal certificates as proof of their Catholic faith; such a request did not offend against the Admissions Code;
- That (subject to there being clear and proper reason for departing from the Diocesan Guidance to which the school was obliged to have regard) it was/would be permissible for the school to include an over-subscription criterion seeking evidence of previous Catholic education in the manner which the school adopted in 2014, and in 2015 (for Year 3 candidates only); the Adjudicator acted unlawfully in concluding that the school had breached the Admissions Code in including this criterion;
- That, while he disagreed with the school's interpretation of Regulation 16 of the School Admissions (Admission Arrangements and Co-ordination of Admission Arrangements)(England) Regulations 2012 in relation to consultation on its admissions processes, the Adjudicator was wrong to conclude that the school could show no evidence that it had as a matter of fact failed to make any meaningful attempt to bring the school's proposed arrangements to the attention of the required consultees.
The judge concluded that – in all other respect – the Adjudicator reached conclusions which were lawful, or not otherwise susceptible to challenge.
Following a subsequent hearing on 29 April Mr Justice Cobb ruled that the Diocesan Guidance issue should be remitted to a newly appointed Adjudicator for re-consideration and determination, with a direction that the Adjudicator reconsider the matter and reach a decision in accordance with his first judgment
The Adjudicator should specifically have regard to the paragraphs (58-61) setting out the proper approach to the phrase ‘have regard’ in paragraph 1.38 of the Admissions Code.
Mr Justice Cobb also ordered the Adjudicator to pay 80% of the school's assessed costs, with a payment on account (by 8 May 2015) in the sum of £60,000.
