Summary: Mrs C complained the Council failed to provide education for her son, who has special educational needs, following his exclusion from school. We upheld the complaint finding for more than four months the Council made either no education provision, or inadequate provision for Mrs C’s son. This loss of provision was an injustice. The Council proposed action it would take to remedy the complaint, set out at the end of this statement. We agreed this would provide a fair outcome to the complaint and so completed our investigation.

The complaint

1. Mrs B complained the Council failed for several weeks to provide education for her son, C, who has special educational needs, following his permanent exclusion from school in November 2024. She said it initially offered unsuitable alternative provision.
2. Mrs B said that C experienced distress through having no education for several weeks. C’s absence from school also caused her distress, impacting on her day to day life, preventing her working and leading to health problems.

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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. 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(1), as amended)
5. Under an 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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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered evidence provided by Mrs B and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
7. I also gave Mrs B and the Council opportunity to comment on a draft version of this decision statement and provide any further information they considered relevant to my proposed findings. I took account of their responses to the draft decision before issuing this final version.

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What I found

Relevant law and guidance

8. 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 the arrangements made to meet them. 
9. 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)
10. Councils must arrange suitable education at school or elsewhere for pupils who are out of school because of exclusion, if they will not otherwise receive suitable education. (Education Act 1996, section 19)
11. For children permanently excluded from school, the law says the council must arrange education provision for the child, from the sixth day after the exclusion. (The Education (Provision of Full-Time Education for Excluded Pupils) (England) Regulations 2007 (SI 2007/1870))
12. Suitable education means efficient education suitable to a child’s age, ability and aptitude and to any special educational needs he may have. (Education Act 1996, section 19(6))
13. The education provided by the council must be full-time unless the council decides that full-time education would not be in the child’s best interests for reasons of the child’s physical or mental health. (Education Act 1996, section 3A and 3AA)

The key facts

14. In November 2024, C’s school permanently excluded him. He was in Year 7 of his education. C has special educational needs and had an EHC Plan.
15. Sixteen days after his exclusion, the Council offered C alternative provision at an education centre in the county. This was more than 20 miles from the home address and catered for a younger age group. Mrs B rejected the provision as unsuitable.
16. A week later the Council identified a home tuition service for C. This began providing home tuition to C in January 2025, after the Christmas holiday period. The tutor provided C with 15 hours a week tuition in core subject areas.
17. Mrs B first complained about the Council’s actions in December 2024, before C had any education provision in place. When the Council replied in January 2025, the tutoring arrangement was agreed, although it had not yet begun. It apologised it had not arranged education provision sooner following C’s exclusion.
18. Mrs B sought to escalate her complaint, considering the Council’s response inadequate. The Council declined to consider her complaint under stage two of its complaint procedure, considering it could not add to its earlier reply.
19. Mrs B then complained to this office in early March 2025.

My investigation

20. I considered the Council’s education service to C for the period mid-November 2024 (following his exclusion) to March 2025, when we received Mrs B’s complaint.
21. In reply to my enquiries the Council:

• agreed the alternative provision it initially arranged for C was unsuitable for his needs;
• explained the tutoring service had not begun teaching C before Christmas 2024 because of “family and tutor availability”;
• said it had also wanted C to receive some extra alternative provision. However, it could not source this before C began transitioning to a new school, which began in June 2025. I noted this followed the Council issuing an amended EHC Plan to C effective from May 2025. The Council said there were delays in it referring C’s case to its commissioning service which arranges alternative provision.

22. The Council said that it recognised because of its delays, C had experienced a loss of education provision. It also understood this would have caused distress. It said that it should have offered more of a remedy to Mrs B after she complained in December 2024. By having to escalate her complaint to this office, the Council considered Mrs B had also experienced unnecessary time and trouble.
23. The Council said in recognition of these impacts, it wanted to offer Mrs B a further apology and symbolic payment of £2620 made up as follows:

• £850 for C having no education provision between mid-November 2024 and January 2025;
• £1270 for C having only part-time education provision, that did not provide all that set out in his EHC Plan, for the period January 2025 to the beginning of June 2025 when he began reintegration at a new school;
• £350 in recognition of Mrs B’s distress;
• £150 in recognition of the unnecessary time and trouble Mrs B experienced.

24. Commenting on the above, Mrs B told us she did not understand what the Council meant in referring to ‘family availability’ (paragraph 21) delaying tuition. She did not consider the family caused any delay to this service beginning.

My findings

25. I found the Council at fault for failing to make education provision available to C until January 2025 following his exclusion. He should have begun receiving provision six days after his exclusion. But he had to wait around five weeks longer with no provision in place.
26. This lack of provision caused an injustice to C. While the Council had offered some alternative provision earlier than this, it agreed this was unsuitable. So, there was nothing that mitigated this injustice.
27. I also found the Council at fault for failing to make full-time education available to C between January and March 2025. There was no evidence C’s special educational needs prevented him accessing full-time education, if tailored to meet his needs in line with his EHC Plan. But the tuition C received, while clearly preferable to him having no support, was not full-time and could not provide all the provision set out in his EHC Plan.
28. C therefore experienced further injustice through a lack of suitable provision for this period also. However, this was less than before Christmas 2024 as there was some provision in place.
29. In addition, I agreed with the Council that C’s absence from education caused distress to Mrs B. And I agreed the Council could and should have offered some remedy to Mrs B’s complaint in January 2025. That its apology alone was not enough to remedy the injustice described above.
30. My findings could not take account of any further fault in the Council’s actions after March 2025, because that was not a period I could investigate. However, I noted and welcomed the Council’s acknowledgement that C remained without access to full-time education until the beginning of June 2025. It was to its credit that it also offered a remedy for this to Mrs B, without a complaint being under investigation.
31. Turning to the details of the remedy offer, I found the Council had taken account of our published guidance on remedies Guidance on remedies - Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman. It based its offer of a symbolic payment on the advice set out in this document. For the loss of provision to C, it calculated the first part of the award (November – December 2024) on a tariff equivalent to £2000 for a term. I considered this appropriate taking account of C’s age and the absence of him receiving any education provision.
32. For the loss of provision from January 2025 onward, the Council used a lower tariff of around £1000 per school term. So, for the period I investigated this equated to a payment of around £550. I considered this fair noting the mitigating factor that C received some education provision in that period, although less than full-time.
33. Because I did not investigate events beyond the start of March 2025, the agreed action in this case included a payment of £720 covering a time where we made no finding of fault causing injustice. Mrs B therefore still had the right to make a separate complaint about that period. But in the event we were to investigate a complaint about that period, I advised we would have to take this award into account as part of any findings.

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Agreed Action

34. The Council agreed that within 20 working days of this decision it would:
1. apologise to Mrs B accepting the findings of this investigation. Our guidance on remedies explains how organisations should apologise effectively to remedy injustice. The Council agreed to consider this guidance when making its apology; and
2. make a symbolic payment to Mrs B of £2620.
35. The Council agreed also to provide us with evidence when it had complied with these actions.

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Final Decision

36. For reasons set out above I upheld this complaint finding fault by the Council caused injustice to Mrs B and C. The Council proposed action that I considered would remedy that injustice satisfactorily. Consequently, I decided to complete my investigation satisfied with its response.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman