Unprecedented Federal Court ruling stops school from expelling year 8 boy with ADHD and ‘behavioural issues’

Disability advocates are praising the Federal Court for stopping a high school from expelling a student with ADHD and alleged behavioural issues. Here’s why.

The Federal Court has taken unprecedented legal action against an ACT high school to stop a year 8 boy with ADHD and alleged behavioural problems from being expelled.

A ruling from Justice Nye Perram, which was handed down last week, halted the pending disciplinary action against the boy, who cannot be named.

The court has ordered the school, which also cannot be named, from “suspending, terminating or otherwise altering the enrolment” of the student, whose behaviour has allegedly caused a teacher to go on stress leave.

The student was ordered by the court to stay at home and not to go to the school campus in the last-minute ruling.

A boy has been ordered to learn at home amid a battle over his enrolment at an ACT school. Picture: iStock

The ruling follows a complaint lodged by the boy’s father with the Australian Human Rights Commission in September which alleged the school is discriminating, or is proposing to discriminate, against the boy on the basis of his disability.

But before this complaint could be resolved, the school told the boy’s parents on November 14 that his enrolment was no longer tenable, leading to the boy’s father seeking action in the Federal Court to protect his son’s rights.

The school agreed to a meeting with the parents on November 18, but before this could occur the boy’s father sought interim action through the Federal Court to stop the expulsion.

The ruling from Justice Perram handed down on November 19 noted that “there is no dispute that the boy has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder”.

He noted: “Any conciliation about how the boy’s behavioural issues are to be managed by the school will be rendered practically irrelevant if the boy is now expelled.”

“Whilst it may be possible to undo any such expulsion, the realities are that this will take time. It would be much tidier to work out what the answer should be at this point rather than to unscramble the omelette of the boy’s education at some later time.”

Despite this, Justice Perram said evidence presented to the court suggested the boy’s behavioural issues have “caused distress to staff and other students”.

“One of his teachers has been forced to take stress leave,” he said.

A review of the boy’s learning plans between March 2024 and November 2025 indicated the school viewed him as having “significant behavioural issues”, prompting the court to order him to finish the last two weeks of school from home despite still being enrolled.

Julie Phillips wants to see an end to the cycle of suspensions and expulsions of children with disabilities.

Julie Phillips, CEO of the Disability Discrimination Legal Service, has labelled the court’s decision “terrific”.

“The research shows expulsions are punitive measures which have a detrimental effect on the behaviour of the student, worsening the situation and passing the student onto another school,” she said.

Ms Phillips said the level of suspensions and expulsions of children with disabilities was “unreasonably high despite it being called out in numerous reports as unhelpful”.

“This places the child in a cycle where they don’t get the support they need then the school responds in a punitive manner and then the behaviour gets worse,” she said. “This goes on until the children is not in school at all.”

The case is ongoing.

Originally published as Unprecedented Federal Court ruling stops school from expelling year 8 boy with ADHD and ‘behavioural issues’