Case Ref: 20 009 662 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council agreed to improve its record-keeping.

Case Ref: 20 009 660 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• Within two months of my decision the Council should provide the Ombudsman with evidence of the changes it has put into place to reflect the remedy it offered for the complaint

Case Ref: 20 008 503 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council has agreed to (within three months): ensure it has a policy in place for providingalternative education to children out of school, which complies with section 19of the Education Act 1996; provide training and/or guidance to all relevant staffon its policy; and review the educational provision in place for childrenof compulsory school age who are on the roll but have not attended school formore than 15 school days and where alternative provision is not being supplied,to ensure there is an assessment of their educational needs and how these needsare being met.

Case Ref: 20 008 176 Category: Adult care services Sub Category: Assessment and care plan

• The Council will also remind staff of the importance of completing a financial assessment in a timely manner.

Case Ref: 20 007 318 Category: Children's care services Sub Category: Child protection

• The Council has agreed to consider how best to ensure all staff have regard to the Council's duty to make reasonable adjustments. This might include a prompt or question in the assessment template about disability and reasonable adjustmentsand/or information in the assessment guidance to parents and carers about reasonable adjustments or advocacy

Case Ref: 20 003 486 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council will review its procedures for dealing with requests for personal budgets and direct payments to ensure it accords with the statutory guidance and that is properly explains its reasons for its decisions.

Case Ref: 20 000 747 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• Review its procedures for the provision of GCSE learning to pupils unable to attend school or engage with tutors.

Case Ref: 19 019 593 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council has agreed to carry out an audit of children for whom it has a statutory duty to provide suitable full-time education under section 19 of the Education Act 1996 to ensure that: children are receiving full-time education on a par with their peers, and any provision due in their Education and Health Care Plan; provision is not being withheld or restricted due to resources or commissioning gaps; where a child is receiving less than full-time education, there is medical evidence to support that this is the maximum amount of education they can access and that this is regularly reviewed.
• The Council has agreed to review its complaint procedures to ensure that, as part of that process, it considers whether a remedy should be provided for any injustice and what other steps may be necessary to resolve the matter complained about.

Case Ref: 19 019 102 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• For the Council to tell me how it will ensure it issues letters and finalises Education, Health and Care Plans within statutory timescales going forward.
• For the Council to tell me how it will ensure it arranges alternative provision as soon as it is aware a child is out of school for whatever reason.

Case Ref: 20 000 639 Category: Education Sub Category: Special educational needs

• The Council has also agreed to: • carry out an audit to identify any other cases where the Council failed to follow statutory timescales within the EHCP review process and develop an action plan to appropriately address and remedy any delays identified;
• • remind its staff of the requirement to adhere to the statutory timescales within the EHCP process;
• • provide evidence the Council has amended its guidance to staff regarding Post -16 provision, specifically, to show that Post-16 cases do not need to be referred to its Specialist Education Panel, and
• • remind its staff to adhere to its complaints policy.