Summary: Miss E complained she had been asking the Council for years to provide her with an education, including a package of education out of school. The Council kept ignoring her. It delayed its complaint response. We uphold the complaint. Because of the fault Miss E did not receive the contents of her Education, Health and Care Plan. The Council has agreed to apologise and make Miss E a symbolic payment.

The complaint

1. The complainant (Miss D) complains on behalf of her daughter (Miss E). They complain:
• they had been asking the Council for years to provide Miss E with an education;
• they asked for a package of education out of school. The Council kept ignoring them;
• they complained, but the Council delayed responding.
2. Miss D says the issues have impacted on the family’s mental health. Miss E’s mental health has deteriorated, as she feels worthless and forgotten by the system. Miss D and her partner have had to watch their daughter deteriorate both physically and mentally, which has been distressing for them.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
4. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
5. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)
6. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).

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What I have and have not investigated

7. We will not usually look at complaints that happened more than 12 months before the complaint to the Ombudsman. But I have used our discretion to investigate events from October 2023, over a year before Miss D’s April 2024 complaint to us. This is because of the Council’s delay in responding to their complaint.
8. I have not investigated any events before that, as it was reasonable for Miss D and Miss E to have come to us earlier about any complaints from that period.

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How I considered this complaint

9. I considered evidence provided by Miss D and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
10. Miss D, Miss E and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Legal and administrative background

11. A child or young person with special educational needs may have an Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan. This document sets out the child’s needs and what arrangements should be made to meet them. The EHC Plan is set out in sections. We cannot direct changes to the sections about their needs, education, or the name of the educational placement. Only the Tribunal or the council can do this.
12. The council has a duty to make sure the child or young person receives the special educational provision set out in section F of an EHC Plan (Section 42 Children and Families Act). The Courts have said the duty to arrange this provision is owed personally to the child and is non-delegable. This means if the council asks another organisation to make the provision and that organisation fails to do so, the council remains liable (R v London Borough of Harrow ex parte M [1997] ELR 62), (R v North Tyneside Borough Council [2010] EWCA Civ 135)

Reviewing EHC Plans

13. The council must arrange for the EHC Plan to be reviewed at least once a year to make sure it is up to date. The council must complete the review within 12 months of the first EHC Plan and within 12 months of any later reviews. The annual review begins with consulting the child’s parents or the young person and the educational placement. A review meeting must then take place. The process is only complete when the council issues its decision to amend, maintain or discontinue the EHC Plan. This must happen within four weeks of the meeting. (Section 20(10) Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014 and SEN Code paragraph 9.176) 
14. Where the council proposes to amend an EHC Plan, the law says it must send the child’s parent or the young person a copy of the existing (non-amended) Plan and an accompanying notice providing details of the proposed amendments, including copies of any evidence to support the proposed changes. (Section 22(2) Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014 and SEN Code paragraph 9.194). Case law sets out this should happen within four weeks of the date of the review meeting. Case law also found councils must issue the final amended EHC Plan within a further eight weeks.

What happened

15. I have set out below a summary of the key events. It is not meant to show everything that happened.
16. Miss E has disabilities that lead her to have special educational needs. She has had an EHC Plan since October 2022. Miss E was attending a further education college, but stopped attending in 2022.
17. The Council carried out a review of Miss E’s EHC Plan in late November 2023. Around a month later it sent Miss E a draft.
18. In April 2024 Miss D chased a response. She advised she had had no communication from the Council’s Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) Service since the annual review.
19. In July Miss E’s advocate sought a response. She noted Miss E was not receiving any form of education. The Council’s SEND Service manager acknowledged the email and copied an officer in, asking her to provide an update as soon as possible.
20. In September Miss D complained, as they had received no further response to their contacts.
21. Miss D did not receive a response at the first stage of the Council’s procedure, so in November the Council agreed to escalate the complaint.

The Council’s complaint response

22. The Council responded in January 2025. It found that its SEND Service:

• had not finalised Miss E’s EHC Plan following the November 2023 annual review;
• was confused about what was needed after it had reviewed Miss E’s EHC Plan, as it had no record of the Plan needing amendment, which it did;
• accepted that monitoring systems for ensuring timescales were met had been an area of weakness for the Service;
• would introduce into its new SEND Handbook quality assurance processes, including regular staff supervision;
• had not responded to Miss D’s communications, including two named emails. It was changing its email contact arrangements as part of a team restructure.

23. As a remedy, the Council:
• apologised;
• offered Miss D £1000, to use for Miss E’s benefit, to recognise Miss E’s avoidable distress caused by the faults it had identified;
• offered Miss D £300 for her time and trouble in pursuing her complaint due to the lack of response at the first stage of its complaints procedure;
• said it would be seeking to carry out an urgent annual review of Miss E’s EHC Plan.
24. The Council has advised us that following its recent restructure, it had put in a Post 16 Team.
25. Miss D says:
• the Council completed an annual review at the end of May 2025. They are happy with the resulting EHC Plan;
• they have not taken the remedies offered by the Council in its complaint response. She says the family was not happy with the apology the Council provided as it was generic and not tailored to the Council’s fault in relation to Miss E.
26. In June 2025, following an Ofsted and Care Quality Commission SEND Inspection, the Department for Education issued the Council with an improvement notice for its SEND service, requiring priority action and improvements.

Analysis

27. The Council should have completed its annual review of Miss E’s EHC Plan by October 2023. It was not completed until May 2025, a delay of 15 months. That delay was fault.
28. I agree with the Council that the delay caused Miss E distress. It also meant she missed receiving the contents of her revised EHC Plan for around three and a half terms.
29. I also accept the delays will also have caused the rest of Miss E’s family their own distress. That distress merits its own symbolic remedy.
30. The Council delayed responding to Miss D’s and Miss E’s complaint, which will have caused some avoidable time and trouble.
31. With reference to the Ombudsman’s guidance on remedies, the Council’s proposed remedy, as set out in its complaint response, does not provide a suitable remedy.

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Agreed action

32. I recommended that, within a month of my final decision, the Council take the following actions.
• Provide a further apology to Miss E and her family, taking account of their view of the reason why they found the Council’s earlier apology inadequate (see paragraph 25). We publish guidance on remedies which sets out our expectations for how organisations should apologise effectively to remedy injustice. The organisation should consider this guidance in making the apology.
• Make Miss E a symbolic payment of £6500 for the missed contents of her EHC Plan, for around three and a half terms. Miss E should use this as she sees fit for her educational benefit.
• Make Miss D a symbolic payment of £400 to recognise the distress the faults caused to the wider family.
• I agree with the Council’s offer of £300 for Miss D’s avoidable time and trouble, due to the delayed complaint response.
33. The Council has agreed to my recommendations. It should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.
34. I am not making any recommendations for service improvements. This is because the Council has a live improvement notice, issued by the Department of Education, for it to improve delivery of its EHC Plan assessments and reviews.

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Final decision

35. I find fault causing injustice. The Council has agreed actions to remedy injustice, so I have completed my investigation.

Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman