Case Ref: 24 005 359 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council will issue guidance or training to relevant officers responding to complaints to ensure it responds to each point of complaint, considers if any identified fault caused an injustice, and how it can remedy any injustice.
• The Council will remind relevant officers of the Council’s duties to consider its section 19 alternative education duty as soon as it is aware that a child is not attending school. The Council should provide relevant officers with a copy of our guidance Out of school, out of sight? published July 2022.

Case Ref: 24 000 521 Category: Adult care services Sub Category: Charging

• The Council has agreed to remind officers of the need to produce care and support plans which explain how personal budgets are to be spent and that they update the plans whenever changes are made.

Case Ref: 23 006 779 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council will remind its Special Educational Needs and Disability staff of its duty to complete the Education, Health, and Care plan process within the statutory timescales and inform parents of their appeal rights to the SEND Tribunal. This is regardless of whether a parent disagrees with the provision and school placement set out in the Plan and its ongoing efforts to find agreement with the parent.

Case Ref: 23 018 577 Category: Children's care services Sub Category: Other

• The Council has now amended Section 4.3 of the statutory complaints policy to differentiate between complaints made in writing and those made orally, in regards to timeframes for stage two investigations.

Case Ref: 23 005 155 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• Remind relevant staff of the Council’s duty to issue EHCPs within timescales set out in legislation.

Case Ref: 23 000 168 Category: Housing Sub Category: Private housing

• The Council agreed to review why the failures in communication happened and to act to ensure they are not repeated on future cases.

Case Ref: 22 017 322 Category: Adult care services Sub Category: Assessment and care plan

• Within three months of thefinal decision the Council should create a specific, measurable, realistic andtimebound action plan to address the factors which led to delays in assessingthe service user's need for s117 aftercare, with the aim of reducing the chanceof recurrences.

Case Ref: 22 009 253 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council will send a reminder to officers dealing with EHCP’s about the need to ensure the timescales set out in the code of practice are adhered to following reviews.

Case Ref: 21 019 054 Category: Benefits and tax Sub Category: Council tax

• The Council has agreed to review its communication and recording systems to ensure applications and queries in respect of exemptions and discounts are dealt with promptly and comprehensively and that full explanations are given for its decisions, in addition to sending out revised bills. (within three months)

Case Ref: 21 011 046 Category: Adult care services Sub Category: Other

• We found the Council at fault for a failure to provide support and assistance to the complainant, to assist him in accessing social care. It failed to do so because he funded his own care. This was fault as councils have a duty to provide such support to all care receivers. The Council has agreed that, within eight weeks of the date of this decision, it will write to the Ombudsman setting out what steps it has taken and intends to take to ensure that it provides the support it should provide to self-funding recipients of adult social care.