Past Information Event – Abrahart vs University of Bristol ruling

In order to support members, NADP organised an online meeting for Heads of Service or their representatives on Monday 6th June 2022 at 13:00-14:30.

Universities and colleges are currently examining the findings of Judge Ralton in the Abrahart vs University of Bristol County Court judgement. This case clearly has hugely significant implications for HE providers and possibly other types of education provider too.

Many Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are putting task forces together to consider how they will respond as institutions and NADP produced a briefing document last week (see references).

At our prior discussion with VWV legal advisers, they mentioned the relationship of this case to the HEI’s Duty of Care requirements and the lack of clarity of start and end-point of this duty and how this may affect discussions within HEIs which is an additional area to consider.

The Independent Review of Children’s Social Care recently recommended that all Higher Education Providers should become ‘Corporate Parents’.  This is already in place in Scotland where all higher education institutions (HEIs) are formally corporate parents by law, and every institution in Scotland publishes a corporate parenting plan to outline how they are fulfilling their legal duty. 

A ‘corporate parent’ is the legal duty for institutions to do everything in their power to improve the lives of care-experienced people, with the same vigour that any good parent would apply to their own children. This means universities will have to:

  • be alert to matters which, or which might, adversely affect the wellbeing of care experienced students
  • assess the needs of care experienced students for services and support they provide
  • promote the interests of care experienced students
  • seek to provide care experienced students with opportunities to participate in activities designed to promote their wellbeing

We think that the relationship with the Bristol findings means that this may need to be considered by HEIs at the same time.

VWV offered to answer questions around explanations of the judge’s remarks and possible implications but could not answer specific questions regarding any particular Higher Education Institution. These questions were submitted beforehand or raised at the meeting and presented to VWV after the event.

The final document is available on the NADP Publications webpage

References

NADP Recommended Discussion Points for the University of Bristol Case

The full judgment is available at https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Abrahart-v-Uni-Bristol-judgment-200522.pdf

Wonke Report on the Bristol University Ruling: https://wonkhe.com/blogs/what-should-higher-education-learn-from-the-natasha-abrahart-case/

Wonke Report on the Care Review: https://wonkhe.com/blogs/care-review/

Full Care Review Report: https://childrenssocialcare.independent-review.uk/final-report/

Additional information:

Shakespeare Martineau Legal Firm have issued a podcast on this topic. The podcast can be found here:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-learnings-from-a-tragedy/id1582033658?i=1000563980443

However there is no transcript so please download here