Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about how the Council dealt with an Education Health and Care needs assessment. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault causing the complainant a significant injustice.

The complaint

1. Miss X complains about how the Council dealt with her child’s Education Health and Care (EHC) needs assessment. Miss X says the Council delayed issuing a final EHC plan naming a school which delayed her child’s transition into that school. Miss X says the Council’s communications were poor and it failed to deal with her complaint appropriately.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. The process to issue an EHC Plan must normally be completed within 20 weeks, although it can take longer if a council refuses to assess a child or to issue an EHC Plan. When issuing a final EHC plan, a Council must either name a school or a type of school. If a parent disagrees with the placement named, or the decision to name a type of school they have the right of appeal against that decision to the SEND Tribunal.
6. The Council issued a final EHC plan for Miss X’s child in June 2023 which named a type of placement. The Council said that it did not name a school as it was still awaiting a response from Miss X’s preferred school (School A). The Council received a response from School A in July to say it could not meet the needs of Miss X’s child, so the Council issued an amended final plan naming a different school (School B).
7. I will not investigate Miss X’s complaint about how the Council managed the issuing of a final EHC plan for her daughter. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault. The Council issued a final plan within the 20-week timeframe and decided to name a type of placement, a decision it was entitled to make.
8. The Council accepted that there was a period where its communication with Miss X could have been better, due to a period of staff absence. Whilst I understand this will have caused Miss X a certain amount of frustration this in itself does not amount to a significant enough injustice to warrant our investigation.
9. The Council accepted that it should have informed Miss X that she could have applied for school places outside of the EHC process. It reminded staff of the importance of informing parents of this. Having considered this point I do not consider that investigating this point further would lead to a different outcome.
10. Finally, we will not investigate Miss X’s complaint about how the Council dealt with her complaints about these matters. This is because it is not a good use of public funds to investigate complaint handling when we are not investigating the substantive issues raised in the complaint.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault causing Miss X a significant injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman