Summary: The Council failed to ensure Mr X’s child Y received therapy and tutor provision in line with their Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan between January 2024 and April 2026. The Council agreed to apologise and make payments to recognise the impact on Y’s education and the distress and uncertainty caused. The Council will also produce an action plan to explain how it intends to deliver Y’s tuition and continue making payments to Mr X until it is in place.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained the Council failed to ensure his child, Y, received therapy and tuition provision as outlined in their Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan since January 2024.
2. Mr X said Y’s education and development has suffered and the injustice is ongoing which has caused distress and uncertainty to the whole family.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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’. If there has been fault which has caused significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
4. 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(1), as amended)
5. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered evidence provided by Mr X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
7. Mr X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Relevant law and guidance

EHC Plans

8. 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.
9. The EHC Plan is set out in sections which include: 

• Section B: Special educational needs.  
• Section F: The special educational provision needed by the child or the young person. 
• Section I: The name and/or type of educational placement.

10. The council has a duty to make sure the child or young person receives the special educational provision set out in section F of an EHC Plan (Section 42 Children and Families Act). The Courts have said the duty to arrange this provision is owed personally to the child and is non-delegable. This means if the council asks another organisation to make the provision and that organisation fails to do so, the council remains liable (R v London Borough of Harrow ex parte M [1997] ELR 62), (R v North Tyneside Borough Council [2010] EWCA Civ 135).

EOTAS (Education other than at School)

11. EOTAS is education for children and young people with EHC Plans who cannot attend any educational setting due to their special educational needs. Instead they receive their education and specialist provision either at home or within another external setting that is not a registered educational setting.
12. The Council has the same legal duty as outlined in paragraph 10 to ensure the child or young person receives all of the provision outlined in Section F of the EHC Plan.

What happened

13. Mr X has a child, Y who is of secondary school age with special educational needs and disabilities. Y has a diagnosis of Autism and significant speech, language and communication difficulties which means they are working well below the level expected of their age. Y has an EHC Plan which outlines the specialist provision they are entitled to. The provision is delivered as part of an EOTAS package. The provision outlined in section F which is relevant to this complaint is:
• 30 minutes a week Speech and Language Therapy (SALT) sessions plus reviews
• 45 minutes a week Occupational Therapy (OT) sessions plus six hours of indirect therapy along with reviews.
• Tuition and life skills sessions for 15 hours a week increasing to 25 hours.
14. A significant amount of provision in Y’s EHC Plan relies on a tutor being in place. For example it lists provision such as sensory activities, social enrichment and oral motor activities which should all be delivered by a tutor under advice from the OT.
15. The Ombudsman investigated a previous complaint from Mr X which found (amongst other faults) the Council at fault for failing to ensure therapy provision and tuition was in place. We made a final decision and provided a remedy up to January 2024. As such, the scope of this complaint begins from January 2024 onwards.
16. The EHC Plan in place in January 2024 was issued during 2023. Y received an amended EHC Plan following a tribunal process in July 2025 however the tuition and therapy provision remained the same in both Plans.
17. In mid-2025 Mr X complained to the Council. He referred to our previous decision and said Y had not received any SALT, OT or tuition from January 2024 onward which amounted to five terms of lost provision.
18. The Council responded to Mr X in June 2025. It apologised for the delay in securing Y’s provision. It said it was unable to identify a tutor with the correct experience to meet Y’s needs. It said it would keep Mr X informed with its ongoing efforts. With regards to OT and SALT the Council said it had found a provider and was now arranging to being the delivery of that provision. The Council offered Mr X a payment of £9,000 to recognise the period of time Y did not receive that provision since January 2024. Mr X did not accept it.
19. Mr X remained unhappy and complained to us.
20. Since his complaint to us Mr X said SALT and OT provision began in October 2025 and has remained in place. He said to date the Council has not provided a tutor.

The Council’s response to us

21. The Council accepted that SALT and OT were not in place for Y between January 2024 and October 2025. It said during that period attempts to source and commission therapy was unsuccessful. It said officers worked on commissioning therapy during 2025 but this was not delivered until October 2025.
22. The Council also accepted Y did not have a tutor in place since January 2024 and this remains the case to date. It blamed a lack of suitably trained life skills tutors as the reason as well as operational drift with a lack of oversight from Y’s allocated officers. It said a referral with Company A was currently underway and it was hopeful of proposing a start date soon. It now has weekly tracking and senior officer oversight in place.
23. The Council said it has strengthened its commissioned arrangements for EOTAS packages and now has a monitoring dashboard for all alternative provision cases as well as EOTAS. It has ongoing discussions with providers to increase commissioning capacity going forward.
24. The Council in response to our enquiries proposed a total payment of £12,200 to acknowledge Y’s lost provision between January 2024 and February 2026.

My findings

25. The Council has a duty to make sure the child or young person receives the special educational provision set out in section F of an EHC Plan. Y’s EHC Plan includes SALT, OT and tuition as outlined above. The Council accepts that SALT and OT were not in place between January 2024 and October 2025. That was fault.
26. The Council also accepts Y has not had a tutor or the life skills provision in place since January 2024. That is fault and this injustice continues to date.
27. These faults have occurred due to a mixture of a lack of suitable therapists and tutors but also a lack of adequate oversight which has caused drift. There were large gaps of Council inaction which contributed to the delay.
28. The lack of therapy and tuition provision has had a significant impact on Y and the wider family. The life skills tuition is vital to prepare Y who has significant needs to prepare them for later life. Y has lost out on SALT and OT for a large part of their teenage years. This has caused distress and uncertainty to Mr X and the rest of the family.
29. We welcome the Council’s acceptance of fault and for the remedy it proposed which is up to February 2026. At the time of writing however it is clear tuition will not be in place prior to the 2026 Easter holidays in April and there is significant uncertainty about when it will be in place after that. I have therefore made a recommendation for a higher payment to reflect this. I have also made a recommendation to remedy the ongoing injustice until tuition is in place.
30. The Council is putting measures in place to improve its commissioning arrangements for therapists and children with EOTAS in general. Following another recent Ombudsman investigation the Council has agreed an action plan to improve areas of its SEND service. This action plan includes
• Commissioning and alternative provision arrangements
• EHC Plan processes
• Engagement and co-production with parents
• Preparation for adulthood and transitions.
31. Given the above I have not made further service improvement recommendations as we will monitor compliance of this through our casework.

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Action

32. Within one month of the final decision the Council agreed to take the following action:
1. Apologise to Mr X, Y and the wider family for the injustice caused by its failure to secure therapy and tuition provision in line with Y’s EHC Plan between January 2024 and April 2026. We publish guidance on remedies which sets out our expectations for how organisations should apologise effectively to remedy injustice. The Council should consider this guidance in making the apology I have recommended.
2. Pay Mr X a total of £12,800 to acknowledge the impact on Y’s education and the distress and uncertainty caused to Mr X and the wider family by the faults.
3. Continue paying Mr X £600 a month (for a maximum of six months) until the tuition provision is in place. The Council should provide us with evidence on a monthly basis when payments are made.
4. Produce an action plan which outlines how it intends to commission and start delivering Y’s tuition provision. The Council should provide us with monthly updates of its progress.
33. Within three months of the final decision the Council should update us on its commissioning arrangements for therapists and specialist tutors for children and young people with EOTAS (Education other than at School) packages.
34. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Decision

35. I found fault causing injustice and the Council agreed to my recommendations to remedy that injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman