The Department for Education has insisted it is up to schools to provide the appropriate support for transgender pupils experiencing mental health issues, despite a coroner’s call for “clarity” over counselling provision after a 13-year-old died.
Outwood Academy Shafton pupil Alex Dews fell from a bridge in Barnsley in July 2022. Coroner Abigail Combes concluded it was “not clear” if he intended to end his life.
Alex had received six weeks’ counselling after telling school staff he wanted to kill himself in March of that year. He had previously been placed on a waiting list for the school’s counselling service, iSpace.
But Alex’s grandmother Susan Dews, 64, of Wakefield, believes he needed more “specialist” support and claims he “fell through the cracks”.
Combes raised concerns to the DfE, the academy and the Department for Health and Social Care in a ‘prevention of future deaths’ report in October.
