Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s actions relating to an Education, Health, and Care Plan. Parts of the complaint are late, and other parts had an alternative legal remedy. Nor will we investigate the delays in completing an annual review, because the Council has agreed to a suitable remedy for Miss X’s injustice. There are no wider public interest issues to justify investigating this complaint.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about the Council’s actions relating to her child’s (Y) Education, Health, and Care (EHC) Plan. She said it should not have removed provision when she first moved to its area and delayed finalising Y’s plan. Miss X wants the Council to secure a specialist provision.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

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. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone has a right of appeal, reference or review to a tribunal about the same matter. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to use this right. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
4. The First-tier Tribunal (Special Educational Needs and Disability) considers appeals against council decisions regarding special educational needs. We refer to it as the Tribunal in this decision statement.
5. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we are satisfied with the actions an organisation has taken or proposes to take. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(7), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
7. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

8. Y is a child on an EHC Plan. We cannot direct changes to an EHC Plan. Only the Council or Tribunal can make changes to an EHC Plan.
9. Miss X was unhappy with the Council’s actions relating to Y’s EHC plan, when she first moved there from another Authority’s area. We will not investigate this part of Miss X’s complaint. This is because these events occurred in 2023 and there are no good reasons why Miss X could not have complained to us sooner.
10. In 2024, Y’s EHC was reviewed. The evidence shows the Council delayed finalising Y’s EHC Plan beyond the statutory time allowed. This fault caused an injustice, because it left Miss X with avoidable uncertainty about the Council’s eventual decision.
11. During our consideration of Miss X’s complaint, the Council agreed to resolve the complaint early. It agreed it would pay her a symbolic financial remedy of £300, within two weeks of my decision. Because this suitably remedies Miss X’s injustice, there is no requirement for an investigation into this part of her complaint.
12. Miss X said the Council’s consultation with a school was flawed during this process, and it used outdated information about Y. She said this meant their EHC Plan was inaccurate. She also wants the Council to secure a specialist school for Y, saying it would be more suitable for Y’s needs.
13. We will not investigate this aspect of Miss X’s complaint. The courts have established that if someone had an appeal right to the Tribunal, the law says we cannot investigate any matter which could have been part of the appeal. We cannot direct the Council to name a placement or change Y’s EHC Plan, and the Tribunal could have done so. Therefore, it is reasonable to have expected Miss X to use that appeal right to achieve her desired outcomes. In any case, we could not achieve this for her.

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Final decision

14. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because parts are late, parts came with an appeal right and of the parts remaining, the complaint is upheld, and the Council agreed to a suitable remedy for Miss X’s injustice. There are no public interest issues remaining to justify an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman