Overview
- Seventeen-year-old Flossie McShea and parent Katie Moore have joined fathers Will Orr-Ewing and Pete Montgomery in seeking a judicial review.
- Lawyers for the group say they will lodge papers in the High Court on Monday through their campaign vehicle Generation Alpha CIC.
- The claimants argue current non‑statutory guidance that leaves decisions to headteachers is unlawful and fails to protect pupils from real‑time harms during the school day.
- Evidence cited includes the Children’s Commissioner survey showing 79% of secondary schools allow phones if kept out of sight and only 3.5% prohibit bringing them to school, alongside FOI examples of safeguarding incidents referred to police.
- The Department for Education says leaders already have powers to ban phones and points to protections under the Online Safety Act, while the claimants list child protection expert Dr Ciarán Murphy as a witness.