Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the provision of Occupational Therapy for the complainant’s son. There is insufficient evidence of fault on the Council’s part to warrant our intervention.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Mrs X, complains that the Council failed to secure the Occupational Therapy set out in her son’s Education Health and Care plan.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mrs X’s son has an Education Health and Care (EHC) plan, which she says provides for him to be educated otherwise than in school, and specifies the provision of Occupational Therapy (OT).
6. Mrs X’s complaint concerns what she regards as the Council’s failure to discharge the duty set out in Section 42 of the Children and Families Act 2014 to secure the provision set out in Section F of her son’s EHC plan. Specifically, she argues that it has failed to secure OT provision. She says it failed to take account of the professional opinion of her son’s previous occupational therapist, and the occupational therapist the Council engaged to deliver her son’s OT from January 2025 lacks the appropriate training and capability. As a result, she has been compelled to source OT privately at her family’s expense.
7. In response to Mrs X’s complaint, the Council has denied fault. It has set out in some detail why it believes the occupational therapist is qualified to deliver the Section F provision and can do so appropriately. Mrs X disagrees and is also critical of the way the Council responded to her complaint.
8. The Ombudsman will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault on the Council’s part to warrant our intervention. The Council has set out why, in its professional judgement, it has secured the Section F provision. Mrs X disagrees. It is not for the Ombudsman to take a view. The Council’s response to the issues Mrs X has raised is reasonable and proportionate and there is no evidence of fault in the way it reached its view. That being the case, we cannot intervene to substitute an alternative decision.
9. Where a substantive matter does not fall to be investigated, we will not normally consider how a council responded to a complaint about it. It is not a good use of our resources to do so. That is the case here.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault on the Council’s part.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman