SCOTTISH Borders Council has been asked to apologise after it failed to support a child who was being bullied at one of its secondary schools.

Concerns were raised with the local authority after the pupil’s private information was accessed by other schoolchildren, according to the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO).

They complained that the council had unreasonably failed to investigate and respond appropriately to incidents of bullying behaviour.

The school’s handling of previous concerns of bullying was also criticised.

The parent, unhappy with the council’s response to their complaints, raised the matter with the SPSO.

A decision report published by the ombudsman, in which the parent is referred to as ‘C’ and the child as ‘A’, states: “The council noted that A’s information had been accessed and investigated the circumstances, but acknowledged that C did not accept the most likely explanation.

“However, the council recognised that the school had not supported A as they would have wished and upheld parts of the complaint regarding the support offered to A and the failure to implement an agreed support plan.

“C was unhappy with the council’s response and brought their complaint to our office.

“We found that, whilst the school had reasonably investigated incidents relating to the accessing of A’s private information, the record keeping of the investigation and response to the incident was unreasonable.

“In addition, we found that the school had failed to record behaviours A experienced as bullying, failed to record incidents on the appropriate systems and did not appropriately record actions taken in response to bullying behaviour.

“We found that the council could not adequately evidence the support in place for A, or actions taken in response to bullying concerns. Therefore, we upheld C’s complaint.”

It added: “Under our general powers to investigate and consider complaints handling we determined that the council’s investigation of C’s complaint was unreasonable given that it had not identified the issues of unreasonable record keeping during the investigation.

“We made a recommendation to address this.”

The ombudsman said it had asked the council to apologise to the parent and child for its failings.

A council spokesperson said: “Scottish Borders Council acknowledges the recent ruling from the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman regarding a case involving our secondary school.

“We take these findings seriously and are committed to implementing all recommendations put forth by the ombudsman.

“The council is dedicated to continually improving our services and ensuring the wellbeing of all children and young people in our care.”