Why should parents have to fight for the obvious?

Few things are more infuriating than watching the public (mal)administration eventually do what it should have done from the outset,but only after citizens have endured months of uncertainty, anxiety and unnecessary hassle. The Commissioner for Education’s closure of recent investigations provides a textbook example.

One began when the mother of a 15-year-old boy attending Guardian Angel Secondary School sought clarity about what would happen after his final year. She would have loved him to continue at Dun Manwel Attard School in Wardija. Instead, she was told that the only available option was Life Map, a privately operated programme.

She was not demanding special treatment. She wanted an appropriate placement for her son and basic information about his future. A properly planned and transparent transition process should have provided both.

Nah, that doesn’t happen when the Machine is clunking along; you either slump into acceptance or complain to someone, in this case the Commissioner for Education, aka the Ombudsman.

His investigation revealed that parents – you know, the people who know their children best and must live with the consequences – are not consulted by the Admissions Board as a matter of course. Administrators attend and answer questions; parents and the child’s Learning Support Educator not so much.

That is more than bureaucratic clumsiness. It reflects a familiar administrative attitude: officials decide, then parents are informed if someone remembers to do that, and anyone who objects shouts into the void.

The Commissioner recommended published admission criteria, parental participation in Board meetings and an internal appeal mechanism.  Did the Powers that Be accept and give meaningful effect to that suggestion?  Don’t go away, all will be revealed.

On trundled the Machine: of 13 applications for Wardija, only four were initially accepted, later reduced to three. The complainant’s son was excluded, even though the school reportedly had capacity for 44 students, provided the necessary staff were assigned.

Sir Humphrey had it pat: the ways of the Civil Service are wondrous to behold, blessed be the Civil Service.  After what the Commissioner described as a “flurry of orders and counter-orders”, every applicant was admitted.

Eventually.  No doubt the official response will be that people should be thankful that everything worked out “in the end”.

And therein lies the rub. Why did this mother have to spend months extracting information, challenging decisions and seeking the Ombudsman’s intervention before her son obtained a place that was ultimately available? Why were families left uncertain about their children’s futures when competent forward planning could have resolved everything beforehand?

And this was not a single aberration.

Many of my readers will be nodding in understanding, knowing full well that City Hall only creaks and groans and strives for results when they are convenient for, wait for it, City Hall.

This was illustrated starkly by the consultation process undertaken with disability organisations. The Commission for the Rights of Persons with Disability and the Malta Federation of Organisations Persons with Disability were presented with plans already devised by the education authorities and a private organisation.

Information arrived “in dribs and drabs” and after decisions had effectively been taken. That was not consultation. It was an announcement from on high, masquerading as a consultation.

At risk of attracting Homer’s ‘’Duuuuh’’, it must be said: genuine consultation happens before decisions are made, while those affected can still influence them. It requires the administration to publish information, explain its proposals, listen and respond. Inviting people into the room after the cake has been baked gives them no say in the recipe, and they’re more than likely to choke on the slice they’re given.

The Commissioner identified the broader disease: disclose as little as possible, obstruct scrutiny and eventually present the decision as a fait accompli.

The victims are parents already organising education, care, transport, therapy and daily support for children with disabilities. It’s not as if they don’t have enough of a burden, however lovingly they bear it.  Do they have to be made responsible for correcting the administration’s failures?

They had to ask questions that should already have been answered, uncover information that should have been public and contest decisions for which no effective appeal existed. The Ministry eventually saw the light, having had the dazzling light of the bleedin’ obvious shone into its eyes by the Education Commissioner. Structured consultation, greater transparency and better forward planning were promised, no doubt with appropriate self-congratulatory photo-ops and pressers.

Read my lips: parents should not have to become investigators, lobbyists and administrative law specialists simply to obtain an appropriate education for their children.