The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision to decline Miss X’s request for a change in her child Y’s home to school transport arrangements. This is because an investigation would be unlikely to find fault with the Council’s actions.
The complaint
Miss X complains that when she asked the Council to allow her to accompany her child Y on home to school transport as a personal assistant or to change the method of transport Y uses, the Council declined her request.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
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: there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Miss X and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Miss X’s child Y has special educational needs (SEN) and has been assessed as requiring home to school transport. Until recently Y was taking a shared bus which picks him up from home and takes him to school.
Miss X complained to the Council earlier this year that Y’s behaviour has deteriorated since using the home to school transport. She asked to be allowed to accompany Y as an unpaid personal assistant or to be given a personal budget to allow her to source private travel arrangements.
The Council declined Miss X’s request, because it contacted Y’s school and transport and neither had noted a change in Y’s behaviour. The Council advised its transport team was willing to work with Miss X and Y to help Y settle into using the service and offered a £7.02 personal budget per day for Miss X to source private travel. The Council advised it would not allow Miss X to accompany Y as a PA or offer a taxi to take Y to school as there was no evidence this was necessary, and its policy was to help children with SEN achieve travel independence.
Miss X brought her complaint to the Ombudsman as she said the personal budget offered was not enough to enable Y to travel to school by taxi.
The Ombudsman cannot question the merits of a decision the Council has made, provided it has made the decision in line with the correct policy. The evidence shows the Council has considered Miss X’s request and spoken with Y’s school and transport team. The Council has found no evidence that Y cannot access the current travel arrangements and has offered Miss X several options to ensure Y can get to school safely. The Council has acted in line with its policy and there is no evidence of fault in its decision making. An investigation would therefore be unlikely to result in finding fault with the Council’s actions.
Final decision
We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because an investigation would be unlikely to find fault with the Council’s actions.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman