Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about a school’s response to Mr X’s son’s needs. We cannot investigate the school’s actions, and any complaint about the Council’s actions is late, with no good reason to exercise discretion to investigate.

The complaint

1. Mrs X said his son’s school failed to identify that the child needed extra support. He said it instead excluded him, often ringing Mr X and his wife to collect him. He said it refused to put provision in place when his son was not attending school. He said the school advised him not to apply for an Education Health and Care (EHC) Plan, and it refused to supply evidence to help with the application, or to work with a provider.

Back to top

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
3. We cannot investigate complaints about what happens in schools. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5, paragraph 5(b), 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)

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information provided by the complainant.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

Back to top

My assessment

7. Most of Mr X’s complaint concerns the actions of a school, which we have no authority to investigate.
8. The Council would have a duty to provide alternative education when a child is absent from school by reasons of illness, exclusion or otherwise, though not if the reason for absence did not fall into those categories. However, the period when this duty might have applied was from 2016 to early 2020, when the last reference to action related to attendance is mentioned in the documents Mr X sent us. Mr X complained to the school about its actions. He could have complained to us sooner about the actions of the Council.

Back to top

Final decision

9. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because:

• we cannot investigate the actions of a school; and
• any complaint about the Council is late, and there is no good reason to exercise discretion to consider it now.

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman