Central Bedfordshire Council (19 012 234)

Category : Education > Special educational needs

Decision : Not upheld

Decision date : 22 Feb 2021

The Ombudsman's final decision:

Summary: Mrs Y complains about the Council’s handling of a safeguarding investigation at her son’s previous school. This investigation was discontinued because no worthwhile outcome is achievable by further investigation.

The complaint

  1. Mrs Y complains:
    • About the suitability of a special education needs (SEN) placement for her child. This relates to the Council’s decision to fund the unit at the school, the competence of staff and a decision to admit more children to the school than the unit could reasonably handle;
    • About the way in which SEN provision was reviewed at the school, and concerns about the amount of education provided;
    • About issues surrounding staff conduct at the school culminating in safeguarding investigations involving the police and the Council.
  2. Mrs Y says there were extensive failures in the Council’s handling of autism provision at the school. She says her son endured 2 years of inadequate and part time education. Her concerns are:
    • The Council failed to put an autism unit in a suitable school.
    • The Council failed to monitor the autism unit at the school.
    • Parents emailed the Council with concerns about the unit as early as 2017 and received no response.
    • The Council overfilled the unit even though it was only built for 8 children.
    • The Council placed children in the autism unit whose primary needs were social emotional and mental health.
    • The Council failed to monitor the unit or check whether appropriately skilled an experienced staff had been employed to manage and work in it.
    • The Council failed to ensure safeguarding procedures were in place.
    • The Council failed to ensure the school reviewed part time timetables and increased children’s hours appropriately.
    • The Council failed to prompt or push the school to do EHCP reviews and phase transfers.
    • The Council failed to provide the specialist support and overall provision set out in her son’s EHCP.
    • The Council did not follow through with improvements it promised when she sent her son back to the school after a restorative meeting.
    • The Council failed to inform her it was moving her son to another school sooner than planned.
    • The Council failed to hold anyone to account or apologise for its failures.
  3. Mrs X says the Council’s failures caused immense stress and loss of earnings for her family.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

  1. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
  2. 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)
  3. We cannot investigate complaints about what happens in schools. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5, paragraph 5(b), as amended)
  4. 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’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:
  • it is unlikely we would find fault, or
  • the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
  • the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
  • it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or
  • it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome, or
  • we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants, or
  • there is another body better placed to consider this complaint, or
  • it would be reasonable for the person to ask for a council review or appeal.

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

  1. If we are satisfied with a council’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)

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How I considered this complaint

  1. I examined the complaint and made enquiries of the Council. I considered the information provided by Mrs Y and the Council. I sent a draft decision statement to Mrs Y and the Council. I considered the Council’s comments on it.

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What I found

Background

  1. Mrs Y’s son has an education, health and care plan (EHCP). He attended an autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) unit at an academy school between December 2016 and March 2019.
  2. Mrs Y and other parents were concerned about the education of their children at the school. Mrs Y says they contacted the Council from as early as 2017 to express their concerns. The parents complained to the Council in November 2018. Around the same time, the Council commenced a safeguarding investigation following reports of assaults on the children by school staff and other violent incidents.
  3. The Council and the headteacher of the school met with parents in November 2018. Mrs Y says the Council would not allow the parents to talk about the catastrophic failures their children had endured but only about how they would try and fix things for children that attend the unit in future. She says the Council did not allow any record of the meeting and refused to take minutes because officers were worried about their failings being exposed.
  4. Mrs Y withdrew her son from school in November 2018 but returned him to the school because she was reassured by promised improvements at the unit. However, she says the Council did not follow through with the improvements. For instance, Mrs Y says:
    • The headteacher told them the Council’s safeguarding officer had signed off after 2 months even though she was meant to visit the school every 4 to 6 weeks.
    • Her son was not allocated a key worker as promised.
    • The Council did not visit and monitor her son’s EHCP and CAMHS referral.
    • The school continued to hire inexperienced staff.
    • Qualified staff were not available along with structured activities at lunchtimes. Violent incidents continued to happen during lunchtimes with no staff around to witness them.
    • Her son’s many exclusions were not looked into by the Council despite her contacting the Council’s Access and Inclusion Officer.
    • The Council did not ensure a specialist service was supporting the school appropriately. Her son tried to hang himself after a man from the service went into the classroom and restrained him.
    • They were not informed about a promised audit or any outcomes from the audit.
  5. The Council reviewed Mrs Y’s son’s EHCP in February 2019. With Mrs Y’s concerns about the school in mind, the Council decided to look for a new school for her son. Mrs Y’s son then moved to a new school in March 2019.
  6. Mrs Y says her son found out about the change of school during a visit to the school. The news that he was going to a new school and the way in which he found out was unexpected and unsettling for him.

Finding

  1. The majority of the matters Mrs Y complains about are outside the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction. This is because these events occurred more than 12 months before Mrs Y complained to the Ombudsman in October 2019. Complaints should be made to the Ombudsman within 12 months of a complainant’s awareness of the matter complained about.
  2. In this case issues involving the suitability of the autism unit; the Council’s decision to fund the unit at the school, the competence of staff and a decision to admit more children to the school than the unit could reasonably handle; the way in which SEN provision was reviewed at the school, concerns about the amount of education provided; and issues surrounding staff conduct at the school culminating in safeguarding investigations involving the police and the Council are caught by the time restriction.
  3. The Ombudsman has discretion to accept a complaint for investigation out of time. But I do not find good reason to accept these matters for investigation now. This is for the following reasons:
    • Parents have a right of appeal against the naming of a school in the EHC plans and so Mrs Y could have exercised this right of appeal in 2016 or afterwards. Similarly, complaints about a shortfall in hours when the children started at the school and issues around the EHC plan reviews could have raised within the necessary timeframe.
    • The claimed assaults and violent incidents cannot be looked at by the Ombudsman as they relate to the conduct of the Academy staff. It was for Mrs Y and others to use the school’s complaints process and failing that, the Department for Education. I note from Mrs Y’s letter of complaint that she did contact the Department for Education.
  4. Mrs Y’s dissatisfaction with the restorative meeting and the Council’s safeguarding investigation are not caught by the time restriction as they occurred within 12 months of her complaint to the Ombudsman.
  5. However, an investigation into these matters would be limited. An enquiry into the
    Council’s safeguarding investigation would be limited because the substantive issues which gave rise to the investigation are outside the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction due to the time restriction. I do not therefore consider there is a worthwhile outcome that can be achieved through further pursuit of this complaint by the Ombudsman.

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Final decision

  1. I discontinued investigation of this complaint because no worthwhile outcome can be achieved through further investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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