Case Ref: 22 013 840 Category: Education Sub Category: Alternative provision

• The Council will ensure all the parents/young people requesting Personal Budget in Education Health and Care plans are provided at the beginning of the process with the information required by law and SEND Code of Practice 2015, including details of the organisations that provide advice and assistance on Personal Budgets and the right to apply for a review of the Council's decision. The Council will provide the evidence that this has been introduced as part of the process.

Case Ref: 22 011 419 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council will remind officers dealing with EHCPs of the need to comply with the timescales set down in the code of practice.
• The Council will remind officers dealing with children that need to move to a different school or type of school of the need to ensure consultations are undertaken promptly and concurrently rather than sequentially.
• The Council will provide evidence of the action the Council is taking to identify additional specialist school places.

Case Ref: 22 010 615 Category: Adult care services Sub Category: Charging

• Review its guidance on record keeping for social care staff and ensure it is fit for purpose and that staff are aware of what is required.
• Complete the review into information sharing between the finance team and care providers.

Case Ref: 22 010 176 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council has agreed to review it procedures for deciding personal budget requests to prevent a recurrence of the delays we found. It will create an action plan explaining what it will do to achieve this.
• The Council has agreed to review its procedures for attending virtual Education, Health and Care plan review meetings to ensure there is not a recurrence of the IT issues we found. It will create an action plan explaining what it will do to achieve this.

Case Ref: 22 007 108 Category: Children's care services Sub Category: Other

• The Council will review the operation of its statutory complaints procedure to identify where it can make changes to prevent delays.
• The Council will provide us with evidence it has reviewed its link family provision.

Case Ref: 22 006 055 Category: Adult care services Sub Category: Assessment and care plan

• The Council has agreed to remind all staff dealing with complaints to respond to dissatisfaction with complaint responses in accordance with its published procedure and to keep complainants informed of progress on a regular basis.
• The Council has agreed to remind all complaint staff to ensure our requests to consider premature complaints through all stages of the complaints procedure are actioned promptly.

Case Ref: 22 005 559 Category: Education Sub Category: Alternative provision

• The Council should provide suitable staff training or reminders to staff of its duties under law and guidance to provide alternative provision when a child of statutory school age is out of school for any reason. The Council should consider sharing a copy of our focus report “Out of school, out of sight?”.

Case Ref: 22 001 487 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council has agreed to highlight the steps it has taken over the past year as part of its reforms to improve the adherence to statutory timescales in producing new EHC plans following a needs assessment and responding to annual reviews of EHC plans and how these improvements are being monitored.

Case Ref: 22 009 178 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• Remind relevant staff of the timescales for issuing final amended EHC plans following the Council issuing an amendment notice and include this in future training.
• Review its procedure for covering cases when staff are absent.
• Review its procedure for considering provision requests to ensure these are dealt with in a timely manner.

Case Ref: 22 008 240 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council will send a reminder to complaints officers to remind them of the need to adhere to complaint timescales, to inform complainants when a response will be delayed and to ensure complaint responses properly address the concerns raised.
• The Council will carry out a training session for complaints officers dealing with special educational needs cases to cover the issue of what can be considered as part of a complaint when an appeal has been submitted to tribunal.
• The Council will send a reminder to officers dealing with EHCP’s about the need to obtain evidence from schools when a parent reports that provision is not in place so the Council can satisfy itself all the provision is in place.