Summary: We cannot investigate Miss X’s complaint about the Council refusing to carry out an Education Health and Care Needs Assessment, or any educational provision lost by her child because of this decision. Miss X appealed the Council's decision with a tribunal and therefore the law says we cannot investigate.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about the Council refusing to carry out an Education Health and Care (EHC) Needs Assessment for her child (Y).
2. Miss X said this led to Y missing over a year of education.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
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. Miss X asked the Council to carry out an EHC Needs Assessment. The Council refused to carry out the assessment. Miss X appealed this decision with the Tribunal in December 2024.
9. Miss X said the Council’s refusal to complete the assessment led to Y being out of school for over a year and missing educational provision.
10. As outlined in paragraph four, we cannot investigate a complaint if someone has appealed to a Tribunal about the same matter. Therefore, we cannot investigate Miss X’s complaint about the Council refusing to assess Y.
11. The courts have established that if someone has appealed to the Tribunal, the law says we cannot investigate any matter which was part of, was connected to, or could have been part of, the appeal to the Tribunal.
12. This means that if a child or young person is not attending school, and we decide the reason for non-attendance is linked to, or is a consequence of, a parent or young person’s disagreement about the special educational provision or the educational placement in the EHC Plan, we cannot investigate a lack of special educational provision, or alternative educational provision.
13. Any loss of educational provision here is closely linked to the Tribunal proceedings. For this reason, we cannot investigate any loss of education which may have occurred because of the Council’s decision not to assess Y.

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Final decision

14. We cannot investigate Miss X’s complaint because she has appealed to the Tribunal about this matter and therefore the law says we cannot investigate.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman