Summary: We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint about how the Council dealt with the review of her child’s Education Health and Care Plan and their education provision. This is because Miss X used her right of appeal to a tribunal and any separable matters happened too long ago.

The complaint

1. Miss X complains about how the Council carried out a review of her child’s Education Health and Care (EHC) Plan. Miss X says the Council delayed issuing the final EHC Plan, did not include relevant information, named a school that could not meet her child’s needs and failed to arrange alternative education provision.

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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 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)
4. We cannot investigate a complaint if someone has appealed to a tribunal about the same matter. We also cannot investigate a complaint if in doing so we would overlap with the role of a tribunal to decide something which has been or could have been referred to it to resolve using its own powers. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
5. 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.

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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. The Council carried out a review of Miss X’s child’s Special Educational Needs (SEN) and issued a final EHC Plan in June 2023. Miss X appealed the contents of the final EHC Plan to the SEND Tribunal. This included the school placement named in the EHC Plan, which Miss X felt could not meet her child’s needs.
9. I will not investigate Miss X’s complaint that the Council delayed issuing its final EHC Plan. This is because this happened more than 12 months ago, and I see no good reason why Miss X could not have complained sooner.
10. I cannot investigate the contents of the Council’s EHC Plan, including the school named or what SEN provision was included. This is because Miss X has used her right of appeal to the SEND Tribunal over these matters.
11. The Council’s actions and decision making that led to the contents of the EHC Plan and the school named are not separable from the appeal itself, nor is the education provision in place whilst the appeal was being considered.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because she used her right of appeal to a tribunal and any separable matters happened too long ago.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman