Summary: The Council has agreed it missed the statutory target date to complete the annual review of a young person’s education, health and care plan, and that its standard of communication with his mother was inadequate. We consider these faults have caused injustice, and the Council has now agreed to offer a financial remedy to reflect this.

The complaint

1. I will refer to the complainant as Mr V. Mr V is represented in his complaint by his mother, to whom I will refer as Mrs M.
2. Mr V complains about delays by the Council’s special educational need (SEN) team, affecting the support he received and leading to a loss of education and a consequent failure to pass his GSCEs. Mrs M seeks compensation from the Council for the impact this had on Mr V.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

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(i), 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)
5. We investigate complaints about councils and certain other bodies. We cannot investigate the actions of bodies such as schools or the NHS. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 25 and 34(1), as amended)

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What I have and have not investigated

6. In representing Mr V, Mrs M complained to the Council about general failures by it, his school, and the NHS, leading to a loss of education for Mr V, and a consequent failure to pass his GCSEs. In response to the complaint, the Council investigated its delay in completing a review of Mr V’s education, health and care (EHC) plan in 2024, and an inadequate level of communication with Mrs M. I will elaborate on the Council’s findings later on in this decision statement.
7. Mrs M then approached the Ombudsman in November 2024, again raising a complaint about the Council’s alleged general failings, with specific reference to Mr V’s GSCEs.
8. However, Mr V sat his GSCEs during the 2022/23 academic year, and so any complaint about a lack of support and a loss of education, leading to his failure to pass the exams, is late, as explained in the previous section. I do not consider there is any reason to disapply this restriction on our jurisdiction and so I will not exercise such discretion here.
9. We also have no jurisdiction to investigate complaints about schools or the NHS.
10. Therefore, my investigation will cover only the points addressed by the Council in its response to Mr V’s complaint.

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How I considered this complaint

11. I considered evidence provided by Mrs M and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.

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What I found

EHC plans

12. 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 what arrangements should be made to meet them. The EHC plan is set out in sections.
13. The council must arrange for the EHC plan to be reviewed at least once a year to make sure it is up to date. The council must complete the review within 12 months of the first EHC plan and within 12 months of any later reviews. The annual review begins with consulting the child’s parents or the young person and the educational placement. A review meeting must then take place. The process is only complete when the council issues its decision to amend, maintain or discontinue (‘cease’) the EHC plan. This must happen within four weeks of the meeting. (Section 20(10) Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014 and SEN Code paragraph 9.176) 
14. If the council decides not to amend an EHC plan or decides to cease to maintain it, it must inform the child’s parents or the young person of their right to appeal the decision to the SEN tribunal.

Mr V’s complaint

15. In August 2024, Mrs M made a formal stage 1 complaint to the Council. She said:

• Mr V had required support at school since 2019, but his school and the NHS had not provided him with the support he needed;
• the Council had taken approximately a year to assess and issue an EHC plan for him;
• there had been a lack of communication from the Council’s SEN team, and a council officer had recommended a college for Mr V which could not meet his needs;
• Mr V had failed his GSCEs because of the lack of support; and
• Mr V’s college was also not providing him with proper support.

16. Mrs M said she was now seeking compensation for the loss of education Mr V had suffered.
17. The Council responded to Mr V’s complaint in October. It noted there had been an annual review of Mr V’s EHC plan in February 2024, which noted he no longer wanted to attend his college and wished to explore alternatives. The Council said it had allocated an officer to the case, who had contacted Mrs M in June to discuss options for Mr V. The Council also noted Mr V had stopped attending the college at the time of the annual review.
18. The Council acknowledged there had been significant delays in processing the annual review of the EHC plan, and upheld the complaint for this reason. It also upheld the complaint because Mr V was no longer attending college, and was therefore not receiving education. The Council apologised and said it had now allocated a new case officer, who would contact Mrs M in the next few days.
19. Mrs M then replied, asking to escalate her complaint to stage 2. She said she had spoken to the new case officer, but explained this was too late, because Mr V no longer felt able to engage in education. Mrs M said the Council should provide compensation to ensure Mr V did not “face the financial burden” of education in future, should he choose to take this on.
20. The Council responded to the stage 2 complaint in November. It noted, first, it could not address the points Mrs M had raised at stage 1 about the school or NHS.
21. The Council acknowledged again its failure to complete the review of Mr V’s EHC plan on time, and explained this was because there was more demand on its SEN team than it could manage. It explained it was seeking to increase the size of the team to help alleviate this. The Council also accepted it had failed to keep in touch and provide information to Mrs M, for which it again apologised.
22. The Council noted, following Mrs M’s recent call with the case officer, “intentions to cease [Mr V’s] EHCP have since been expressed”, which the Council acknowledged was due to a perceived lack of service availability in the area.
23. However, the Council declined to offer compensation, because it did not “currently have a compensation policy”.
24. Mrs M then referred the complaint to the Ombudsman.
25. In February 2025, the Council issued a formal letter, stating its intention to cease Mr V’s EHC plan.

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Analysis

26. The annual review meeting for Mr V’s EHC plan took place on 5 February 2024. The Council then had four weeks to issue a decision to either maintain the plan in its current form, amend it, or cease it. This means the Council should have issued its decision by 5 March.
27. However, it does not appear the Council took any further action at all until late June, when it allocated an officer to Mr V’s case. The officer then contacted Mrs M to discuss possible options for Mr V from September, bearing in mind his wish to leave his current college. After this, it again does not appear the Council took any further action until assigning the new case officer in October, by which point Mr V had decided not to continue with the EHC plan.
28. Even at that point, the Council did not actually issue a formal decision to cease the plan. It sent Mrs M a letter confirming the proposal to cease, and asking for her comments within 15 days. My understanding is Mrs M did not respond to this letter, but the Council then did not formally cease the plan until February 2025. This was a very lengthy delay.
29. By delaying its decision, the Council in turn delayed Mr V’s right of appeal against the decision, which was only triggered when it issued the formal ‘cease’ letter. This is something we typically consider to be an injustice to a complainant in similar circumstances. In this case, it was Mr V’s own wish to cease the plan, and so the delay in the right of appeal appears inconsequential.
30. What is not clear, however, is when Mr V came to this decision. In June, the Council’s case officer provided Mrs M with information about other options for Mr V. Although I do not know what Mr V felt about this at the time, it does not appear there was any suggestion, at that stage, that he did not wish to continue with his EHC plan. It seems quite possible, therefore, Mr V would have made a different decision, had the Council dealt with his EHC plan review more promptly. This creates a significant uncertainty, which is an injustice.
31. I note the Council has already apologised both for this, and for the lack of information it provided to Mrs M during the process. This is positive. However, the Council also declined Mrs M’s request for compensation, on the basis it does not currently have a relevant policy.
32. This is a peculiar comment. We frequently recommend, and encourage councils to offer, financial remedies where there has been fault in their actions which has caused injustice. This is not ‘compensation’ of the type a court might award, but it is clearly appropriate for a case such as this one. And indeed, I can see the Council has agreed to our recommendations to offer financial remedies in other recent cases, so I am satisfied it should have been aware of this.
33. Therefore, In accordance with our published guidance on remedies, I consider the Council should offer to pay £400 to Mr V, to reflect the uncertainty arising from the delay in processing his annual review. I also consider the Council should offer Mrs M £200 to reflect her own distress because of this, and for the effects on her of its poor standard of communication. I make recommendations to this effect.

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Action

34. Within one month of the date of my final decision, the Council should offer to pay Mrs M:

• £400 on Mr V’s behalf, to reflect the uncertainty arising from the delay in processing his annual review; and
• £200 to reflect her own distress because of this, and for the effects on her of its poor standard of communication.

35. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Decision

36. I find fault causing injustice.

Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman