A COUNCIL telephone blackout forced a court case to be adjourned again.

Swindon Magistrates Court had been due to hear the case of one Swindon mother alleged to have kept her son off secondary school for a week in November.

The mother, 46, who cannot be named for legal reasons, appeared before the court in June. She said her son’s absence was due to a blood condition. Magistrates adjourned the case and asked her to bring in a doctor’s note supporting her defence.

Yesterday, Swindon Borough Council solicitor Rosie Heath said she had received no medical evidence from the mother since June’s hearing.

The woman, who pleaded not guilty to knowingly allowing her child to be absent from school for five days in November 2017, said doctors had wanted £50 for a print out of the medical record: “I don’t have that kind of money at the moment.”

Instead, she brought in a prescription note written by a doctor in September and giving her son antibiotics for cold-like symptoms that the mother claimed were a result of his blood disorder.

Ms Heath asked for a brief adjournment to get instructions from council education officers. But she told magistrates she was unable to get through: “I have tried to contact several people at the council, then I went through to the switchboard. It seems as if the whole of the council’s telephone lines are not working. On that basis, I would like a short adjournment, so I can get some instructions.”

Magistrates adjourned the case to August 14.