SCARLETT Godden is, says her mum, "a bright girl in a body that doesn't work very well" but now, following a funding row, she is back at a school where they hope to unlock her potential.

The Newport four-year-old, who has complex health problems, spent several months at the Welsh School of Excellence for Conductive Education in Cardiff before Newport city council stopped funding her travelling costs because its experts concluded it was not the best place for her.

For a year she could not go and mum Suzanne Degroot, from Partridge Way, Duffryn, said her daughter stopped making progress.

Miss Degroot threatened legal action, but an independent tribunal has ruled that the school is the best place for Scarlett.

A Newport city council spokeswoman confirmed it is now to fund her place and travel costs.

Miss Degroot: "I could never understand how they paid for her travelling costs and accepted she was going there, then changed their minds. It has been a long, hard battle, as it always seems to be to get what Scarlett needs, but she's back there now and she's thriving."

The school, based off Colchester Avenue in Cardiff, offers intensive holistic therapy for youngsters with a range of physical and learning disabilities.

"Scarlett goes there four mornings a week for therapy, which is really doing her good," said Miss Degroot.

"She is quadriplegic, with total body cerebral palsy, but she's bright. She doesn't miss a trick and she's got a wicked sense of humour.

"I believe the conductive education they provide in Cardiff is the most likely way of enabling her to achieve the very best she can.

"The doctors believe she had been distressed in the womb for three weeks before she was born and she was distressed during labour. She was gone for eight minutes at one stage and they managed to bring her back, but they gave her 48 hours to live.

"So she's already come a long way and I think she's got plenty more to offer."