Bristol Safety Valve Legal Challenge

Half-hour decision by councillor looks to be an expensive mistake

Bristol City Council is facing Judicial Review regarding its controversial Safety Valve agreement with the Department for Education (DfE).

The council caused controversy in March this year when it was revealed the application had been made secretly without public knowledge or scrutiny.

A legal challenge will now be heard later this year.

Safety Valve was a very late agenda item to Cabinet in March 2024, which once again saw Bristol Send (Special Educational Needs and Disabilities) causing a political storm. A request was made by the former mayor Marvin Rees, along with senior council officers to push through and approve the council’s Safety Valve application after it had been made in a secret deal with the DfE.

Green Party Councillor for Southville, Tony Dyer – since made leader of Bristol City Council – allowed Rees to add the council’s secret Safety Valve application to Cabinet on 05 March 2024.

Rees asked for Dyer’s permission to invoke APR16 due to his position of Chair of Overview Scrutiny and Management Board.

At the time, Dyer said: ‘Also copied into the email were the Cabinet Members for Children Services, the Deputy Mayor and Cabinet Member for Finance, the Chief Executive, the s151 Officer, the Monitoring Officer, the Executive Director for Children and Education, and the Director of Education and Skills.

‘Unless I was willing to accept that not only the Mayor of Bristol but also several senior officers were complicit in creating a false narrative around the urgency of the decision required by the Department for Education, then I had no evidential reason for refusing to agree to APR16 being applied.’

Dyer made the decision within half an hour of being contacted by Rees. The late Cabinet paper, which was allowed through, was not published online until 24 hours before the meeting, allowing for no scrutiny and no proper ability for the public to take part in Public Forum.

After controversy grew around Safety Valve being passed, Dyer said that the decision to allow APR16 was his decision alone and that he was ‘solely responsible’.

It could prove to be a costly mistake after leave was granted by the High Court this month allowing the Bristol Safety Valve to be challenged. The hearing will be in December 2024.

Bristol Send Justice said that the High Court had granted leave for a ‘challenge to the Safety Valve scheme in Bristol.’

The campaign group stated: ‘This is on the basis that, arguably, BCC acted unlawfully in their failure to consult with parents of SEND children and other interested parties, before entering into the Safety Valve agreement with the DfE.

‘The substantive Judicial Review case will be heard by the High Court in December.’

Heavy-weight Send barrister Steve Broach said on X, that he was glad that part of Keith Lomax’s ‘legacy’ would see ‘proper scrutiny’ of whether Bristol City Council ought to have consulted before entering into its Safety Valve agreement on Send funding.

The Judicial Review challenge had been started by Keith Lomax, of Watkins Solicitors who died earlier in the year.

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