An EAST Finchley mother has vowed to take legal action against Barnet Council if it refuses to pay for her disabled son to attend a special school in the United States.

Helena Scott, 32, of Fortis Green Road, moved to the US ten years ago to send her severely autistic son, Oliver, to the specialised Boston Higashi boarding school, in Massachusetts. In November last year, illness forced her to move back to the UK, temporarily leaving her son at the school. US funding for her son has now been withdrawn.

Mrs Scott felt her only option was to ask the local authority for help with the fees. But the council said it was unable to consider Oliver's case because it was under a legal obligation to assess him in person before making a decision, and he had not yet returned from the US.

But Mrs Scott claimed moving her son before the end of the academic year "could result in regression and a downward spiral of issues related to his condition".

She has now engaged a solicitor who specialises in special educational law to help fight her case in Barnet.

She is hoping the council will agree to pay for 15-year-old Oliver, who has the mental capacity of an eight-month-old baby, to conclude his term in the US and then either continue to support him there or pay for him to attend the Rugeley Horizon School, in Staffordshire, which offers a similar, highly structured curriculum.

Mrs Scott, who was diagnosed with Graves' disease in March 2007, and suffers from fatigue and high blood pressure, eventually brought Oliver back to the UK on Monday.

She said: "The council has forced me into bringing Oliver home. All in all, it has been extremely unsympathetic.

"I don't think it understands this situation at all. It's a complete nightmare. Oliver suffers a great deal when he's moved from the sort of highly structured environment available, like Higashi, and he cannot function properly at home."

But councillor Fiona Bulmer, cabinet member for children's services, said: "Mrs Scott has raised some new issues which has unfortunately delayed a response. We are working to respond to her as soon as possible."

Oliver was diagnosed with severe autism when he was three years old. He is now 15, but cannot use the toilet on his own and is often hyperactive and aggressive.

Because he has always needed specialised 24-hour care, in 1997 Mrs Scott felt that few schools in the UK were appropriate for him, so she launched a successful campaign for Enfield Council to pay his first year fees at Higashi - the same amount, she claims, it would have paid should he have stayed in this country.

Following her marriage to an American in 2001, the rest of Oliver's fees were paid by the American authorities.

Mrs Scott now wants Barnet to follow Enfield's lead.

She said: "It is the council's duty to provide for children like Oliver. He needs a very specific type of education, he can't just go to any day school. If it the council leaves him for two, three, four months, his condition will regress beyond belief."