The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s actions in issuing an Education Health and Care Plan for Mrs X’s child. There is not enough evidence of injustice flowing from the Council’s actions to warrant investigation.
The complaint
Mrs X said the Council failed to communicate properly with her during the process of issuing an Education Health and Care (EHC) for her child. She said it breached regulations and delayed her right to appeal against the Plan it issued, not least by failing to issue a letter.
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 any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B)) Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
The Council accepted many the points of Mrs X’s complaint. She said she found dealing with the Council was stressful because of failures in its actions. However, the EHC Plan was due to be issued at a point of stage transition for her child, and the deadline for that was 31 March 2025. Regardless any preceding fault, the Council issued a final EHC Plan Mrs X had the right to appeal against within six weeks of the 31 March 2025 deadline. This named the setting she wanted, though not all the provision. There is thus not enough evidence of sufficient injustice flowing from the Council’s actions to warrant investigation by us.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of injustice flowing from the Council’s actions to warrant our further involvement.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman