Summary: Ms X complained about the Council’s failures with alternative provision when her child could not attend school. We found the Council at fault for not properly considering its duties and poor complaints handling. Ms X sourced private provisions at her own expense. The Council has agreed to apologise, reimburse Ms X’s costs and make a symbolic payment to recognise the injustice caused. It also agreed to take action to prevent future recurrence of the faults.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains the Council failed to provide suitable full-time education to her child between January and December 2024 when they could not attend school. Ms X privately funded education for her child with an alternative provision provider and she said the limited provision made by the school was inadequate. This has caused significant frustration, distress and financial impact on the family.

Back to top

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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)
3. 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)
4. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

5. I discussed the complaint with Ms X and considered her views.
6. I made enquiries of the Council and considered its written responses and information it provided, as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
7. Ms X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

Back to top

What I found

Law and administrative background

Alternative provision

8. Councils must arrange suitable education at school or elsewhere for pupils who are out of school because of exclusion, illness or for other reasons, if they would not receive suitable education without such arrangements. The provision generally should be full-time unless it is not in the child’s interests. (Education Act 1996, section 19). We refer to this as section 19 or alternative education provision.
9. We issued a focus report “Out of school, out of sight?" issued in July 2022, updated in August 2023. This highlighted guidance on how we expect councils to fulfil their responsibilities to provide education for children who, for whatever reason, do not attend school full-time.
10. Statutory guidance around arranging education for children who cannot attend school because of health needs, and separately, where a mental health issue is affecting attendance (Department of Education, 2023) says:
• councils should not follow an inflexible policy of requiring medical evidence before making a decision about alternative education. It must look at evidence for each individual case, even where there is no medical evidence readily available, to make its own decision.
• Local authorities should, alongside the child’s school, regularly review the provision offered to ensure that it continues to be appropriate and that it is providing suitable education, including seeking input from the parents.

Background

11. Ms X’s child (J) had difficulties attending the “School” due to their needs, including sensory processing issues and high levels of anxiety. In January 2024, J stopped attending completely.

What happened – summary of key relevant events

12. Between January and March 2024, Ms X had regular contact with the School about J’s struggles, suspected autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and not accessing education. She discussed various steps and strategies with the School to help support J return to it. She decided to use an online education provision (Provider 1) with specialist teachers as a temporary solution to re-engage J into learning. She had concerns with the financial costs and asked if the School could contribute funding. It did not.
13. Ms X also contacted an alternative education provider for advice about interim provision while J could not attend the School. It advised Ms X to ask the School to refer J to the Council’s internal Alternative Provision (AP) Panel. In early March 2024, the School shortly sent a referral to the AP Panel.
14. Around this time in March to April 2024, the School also referred J to the Council’s Education Welfare Service (EWS). The EWS officer sent Ms X an attendance warning letter. Ms X emailed the EWS officer explaining the complexity of J’s situation. She intended to remove J from the School’s roll due to the Council’s warnings about potential further action. After discussions with the School, the EWS officer later closed the case and referred it back to the School.
15. At the end of April 2024, the Council AP Panel wrote to the School. It would not consider the AP referral as it was for medical needs tuition, but the School had not provided any medical evidence for J.
16. In early May 2024, the School referred J to the AP Panel again, with a GP report. The next week, the Council wrote to the School. It noted “[J] no longer attends school and is currently receiving private tuition”. The AP Panel proposed the use of the AV1 robot for J (a small robot where children can virtually participate in school by staying connected remotely). It asked the School to arrange this, facilitated by a Council officer.
17. Between June and July 2024, Ms X emailed the School about J’s use of the AV1 robot. She wanted to build it up to classroom learning as J currently used it for occasional informal group sessions. The School said J needed to be at the School in a separate room for this. Ms X had concerns as that was not the intended purpose of the robot, it was to help children who could not physically attend school.

Ms X’s formal complaints

18. At the start of May 2024, Ms X wrote to the Council with a request for Section 19 AP for J, recently diagnosed with ASD. As they had no educational support, she said they used Provider 1 (at her own expense) where lessons for J had built up from February 2024. She asked the Council to fund it as an AP provider while they continued to work on J’s return to School. The School provided a supporting letter for temporary tutoring to maintain J’s involvement in learning. Ms X submitted it to the Council as a formal complaint.
19. Two weeks later, the Council emailed Ms X. It said she should re-direct it to the School as the School was responsible for arranging AP. It could not deal with her complaint and closed it.
20. Between June and July 2024, Ms X also tried to escalate her complaint twice with the Council. Ms X did not receive a response.
21. In October 2024, Ms X wrote to Senior Management with her complaint. She continued to pay for Provider 1 and funded mentoring sessions for J. It was working well for J but she wanted the Council to provide the AP. The Council acknowledged the complaint. As it previously closed it with no formal response, it would consider it at Stage 1.
22. In November 2024, the Council sent its response. It referred to the AP Panel decision in May for the AV1 robot to allow J to access education from home. It contacted the School who sent it a support log of evidence. The Council said this showed J had accessed education at the School part time through the AV1. If the School had concerns, it could return to the AP Panel. It did not uphold her complaint.
23. Ms X responded. She outlined the issues with the AV1 robot as the School would not allow J to use it as intended, leading to very limited sessions, and it did not constitute full time education. The Council said it would speak to the School and if it did not change its position, it would ask the School to go back to the AP Panel to consider further options.
24. In December 2024, the Council wrote to the School after a re-referral to the AP Panel. The Council said its AP provider would offer J support through tuition at a temporary placement. J started regularly attending this.
25. In March 2025, Ms X wrote to the Council to escalate her complaint. She gave the previous history and requested full reimbursement for Provider 1 tuition and mentoring sessions for J. In late May 2025, the Council responded at Stage 2. It apologised for the delays with her complaint. It was satisfied with its actions. It would not reimburse Ms X as she funded tuition independently and it maintained the School’s provision was appropriate. In July 2025, Ms X complained to us.

Analysis

26. The investigation is limited to considering the role of the Council. We cannot consider the actions of the School as they are not in our remit to investigate.
27. The Council’s EWS officer acted on an attendance referral from the School by sending a warning letter to Ms X. But good practice would have been to communicate with the School first in a co-ordinated approach to assess the appropriateness of any formal action. I recognise Ms X was distressed by this along with emails with the EWS officer. However, they shortly ended their involvement after they did engage with the School. In my view, injustice to Ms X is limited here. In any event, the main focus of my consideration relates to the Council’s AP duties below.

Alternative provision

28. Section 19 of the Education Act 1996 places councils under a duty to make arrangements for the provision of suitable education, at school or otherwise, for children who, because of illness or other reasons, may not receive suitable education unless such arrangements are made for them. We expect councils to consider a child’s individual circumstances and decide, at the time, whether it has a statutory duty to provide AP.
29. In early 2024, Ms X had contact with the School about J’s attendance and education. From the evidence seen, the Council first became directly aware of J’s situation in early March 2024, by the School’s referral to the AP Panel. I will consider the Council’s actions from that point.
30. Nearly 8 weeks later (the Council has not explained the time taken), the Council rejected the School’s first referral as it said there was no medical evidence. Statutory guidance (see Paragraph 10) says councils should make their own decision about AP and a child’s individual circumstances, if there is no medical evidence. The Council should have promptly explored the reasons for non-attendance to make an informed decision on whether J was ‘otherwise’ unable to attend school for a valid reason (not just medical need). I have not seen records to show the Council did at this stage. This is fault, along with some initial delay.
31. The AP Panel then promptly considered J’s case after the School made another referral soon after. It proposed the AV1 robot. However, there is only the outcome letter and no decision-making notes. I cannot see evidence of how the Panel decided the suitability of the provision, if it considered how many hours it was intended for, or how this constituted full time education. I cannot see the Council decide how long it should be in place, if this would be short term, or what the AV1 robot intended to achieve overall under Section 19. This is fault.
32. The Council did not monitor ongoing suitability or J’s progress with this, with the School or Ms X. It should have kept this under review to satisfy itself at the time of events. It relied on the School to do this, but the ultimate duty and responsibility for AP lies with the Council. This lack of oversight is fault. If it had done this as it should, there is some uncertainty for Ms X about whether the Council could have intervened sooner when the AV1 robot issues came to light.
33. In November 2024, the Council referred to a support log from the School which it only obtained to respond to Ms X’s complaint. The Council has no contemporaneous evidence it checked with the School about J’s provision before this. This log referred to limited sessions with the AV1 robot, generally used for a weekly virtual friendship group and weekly reading group. I cannot see the Council’s reasons for why it considered the School’s limited offer suitable as education (as amounts appeared far below full time) or consideration of subjects in the curriculum.
34. The Council used this log to say J was making use of some provision at the School so it did not need to act. But I do not consider this adequate to meet its responsibilities, with no evidence of regular contact with the School before this. This is further highlighted at the late stage when Ms X made the Council aware of the School’s use of the AV1 robot and the Council then promptly asked the School to re-refer it to the AP Panel. This led to the Council offering a placement which J attended successfully.

Injustice

35. Overall, considering the above, I am not satisfied the Council evidenced proper consideration of its duties or took robust action from a Section 19 perspective relating to J’s education. This meant J had limited provision by the School. But Ms X arranged AP herself so J would not be left completely without education. This lessens some injustice to J. But there is injustice to Ms X with quantifiable financial loss which flows from fault by the Council, for which I make a recommendation below.

Complaint handling

36. The Council closed Ms X’s initial complaint without good reason as it (incorrectly) said the School was responsible for alternative provision. This is concerning and a clear training need. It later did not respond to Ms X’s efforts to escalate her complaint on at least two attempts. When it did review her complaint formally, it’s Stage 2 response was around five weeks late. The above faults with complaints handling caused injustice to Ms X with avoidable frustration and distress.

Back to top

Agreed Action

37. To remedy the injustice set out above, the Council has agreed to carry out the following actions:
38. Within one month of the final decision:
• Apologise to Ms X for the injustice caused by the faults identified (in line with our guidance on making an effective apology);
• Reimburse Ms X the cost of Provider 1 provision and mentoring sessions for J from March to December 2024, in line with evidence of receipts and invoices provided; and
• Pay Ms X a symbolic payment of £200 to recognise her injustice with general distress, frustration and uncertainty, along with avoidable time and trouble with its poor complaints handling.
39. Within three months of the final decision:
• The Council should share this decision as a case study with relevant staff, alongside a copy of our “Out of school, out of sight?" focus report. It should highlight key points to ensure officers are aware of their responsibilities when a child is not able to attend school, factors it should consider to make timely decisions, how it monitors provision, and make clear the ultimate duty for alternative provision is with the Council, not schools. The Council should discuss and identify relevant points of learning, including with the complaints process, and share any other action it will take to prevent future recurrence of faults.
40. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

Back to top

Decision

41. I find fault causing injustice. The Council agreed to my recommendations to remedy the injustice. I have completed my investigation.

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman