Summary: We will not investigate this complaint that the Council has failed to ensure appropriate educational provision for the complainant’s daughter while she has been unable to attend school. Our intervention is unlikely to add anything significant to the investigation the Council has already carried out, or lead to a different outcome, and is not therefore warranted.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Miss X, complains that the Council has failed to ensure her daughter has been provided with appropriate education while she has been unable to attend school.

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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 effect 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 an investigation if we decide the tests set out in our Assessment Code are not met. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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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. Miss X says her daughter has been unable to attend school since 2024. She says that, despite making a request for alternative educational provision under section 19 of the Education Act 1996, and an Education Health and Care (EHC) plan having been issued, no appropriate educational provision has been made.
6. Miss X says the Council’s failure to meet its section 19 duty has had a negative impact on her daughter’s education and welfare, and on the welfare of other family members. She believes the Council should accept that it has been at fault and compensate her for the expense the family has had to incur.
7. It is not for the Ombudsman to express a view on whether the Council’s section 19 duty was engaged in Miss X’s daughter’s case. That was a matter for the professional judgement of the Council’s officers.
8. The complaint correspondence indicates that the Council initially communicated with the school and satisfied itself that it was making efforts to reintegrate Miss X’s daughter. It concluded therefore that it was not appropriate for it to make alternative provision at that point. That was a decision for the Council to make, and the Ombudsman will not criticise it or intervene to substitute an alternative view.
9. The Council subsequently failed to review the matter to ensure the school’s efforts to make provision were effective. It accepts that this omission amounted to fault on its part and has apologised.
10. It was appropriate for the Council to uphold Miss X’s complaint in part and to apologise. It does not however follow that, if the Council had carried out a review, it would have accepted that its section 19 duty was engaged. We cannot therefore say specific provision would have been made and it is not appropriate for us to recommend that the Council take any action in addition to the apology it has already made.
11. Miss X also complains that, since the EHC plan was issued, the Council has continued to fail to secure provision for her daughter. There are insufficient grounds for us to pursue this aspect of the complaint. The correspondence shows that, at the point at which Miss X complained to the Ombudsman, the Council had received a request for alternative provision from the school, and was considering how to meet it by way of providing Miss X with a personal budget. This was a reasonable and proportionate course of action and was not, at that stage, subject to significant delay. The Ombudsman’s intervention is not therefore warranted.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because our intervention is unlikely to add anything significant to the investigation the Council has already carried out, or lead to a different outcome.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman