Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling of Special Educational Needs provision because Mr Y could have appealed to the Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal. There is also insufficient evidence of Mr Y suffering significant injustice.

The complaint

1. Mr Y complains about the Council’s delays in securing a specialist secondary school placement for his child. He says this resulted in stress and frustration.

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. 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.
5. 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:

• any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

8. The Council issued an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) for Mr Y’s child. The plan identified specific school placements for Mr Y’s child, a mainstream primary school and a specialist secondary school. The Council were clear that Mr Y’s child would remain on a waiting list for the secondary school placement until a vacancy became available.
9. Mr Y says the delays in confirming the secondary school placement caused stress and frustration. The Council acknowledged this, and reassured Mr Y that his child would be allocated the special school placements as soon as they became available. I am aware that the specialist secondary school placement has now been allocated for Mr Y’s child, in advance of him transitioning from primary to secondary education. Therefore, there is insufficient evidence of Mr Y suffering significant personal injustice because of any delays.
10. Also, Mr Y could have appealed to the Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal to challenge the Council’s decision about the school placements named in his child’s EHCP if he disagreed with these. It would have been reasonable for him to do this and therefore we will not investigate this complaint.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate Mr Y’s complaint because he could have appealed to the Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal and there is insufficient evidence of Mr Y suffering significant injustice to warrant an investigation by the Ombudsman.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman