Derby City Council pays thousands to family over education failures

Derby City Council bosses say improvements have been made after the authority was ordered to pay almost £5,000 in compensation for failures over a child’s education needs. The authority has accepted findings of an Ombudsman investigation and made improvements in staffing numbers to help cope with "demanding challenges" in progressing educational, health and care plans for children who need them.

An Education, Health and Care plan (EHC) is a legal document for children and young people who need more support than is available through special education needs (SEN) support. This can only be issued after an assessment process.

The Ombudsman was asked to intervene after a mum, named in case reports as Ms Y, complained to the council about how it was dealing with her child’s education needs.

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Where a council receives a request for an EHC needs assessment, it must decide whether to agree to the assessment and send its decision to the parent of the child or the young person within six weeks.

Ms Y, complained that the council failed to complete her child’s EHC needs assessment, issue the care plan within statutory time scales and provide the child with a suitable education from November 2021. At that time the child (known in case reports as Z) was at a mainstream secondary school but was struggling to attend. The school tried to support them in a number of different ways but without success.

Ms Y says Z stopped attending the school altogether from February 2022. No alternative provision was arranged for Z. In June 2022, the child was diagnosed as having Autistic Spectrum Condition.

In November 2022 Ms Y requested the city council to carry out an assessment of her child’s needs. In its statement to the council in support of Ms Y’s request, the child’s school said Ms Y’s request was urgent as the child’s situation “continued to deteriorate rapidly”.

From December 2022 Z was provided with a vocational training session, one morning a week (2.5 hours), as alternative provision. No other provision was arranged. In May the council instructed an educational psychologist to complete a report for Z’s EHC needs assessment. The educational psychologist contacted Ms Y about this in May. The council would consider the report before deciding whether Z should have an EHC Plan.

But in September Ms Y had heard nothing further from the council about the outcome of the EHC needs assessment. She complained to the council about its delay in completing this.

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The council accepted, in its complaint response, it had not completed the assessment within the statutory timescales. The council said its delay was because it was dealing with an increased volume of requests for EHC needs assessments.

A final care plan was issued for Z in November 2023 - a year after Ms Y first approached the council for help.

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman ruled Derby City Council were at fault for - failure to complete the assessment process within statutory timescales, failure to provide Z with a suitable education and failure to monitor the delivery of the provision in Z's EHC plan. They said Z had missed a whole school year of suitable education due to the council's failures.

It stated in its report: "It (the council) should have told Ms Y by January 26 2023 it had decided to carry out an assessment. It should then have issued the final EHC Plan by April 3 2023. And the final EHC plan wasn’t issued until November 10 2023 - more than seven months late.

“The school made it clear in November 2022, Z’s school attendance and engagement issues were 'urgent' and the situation was deteriorating rapidly. The delay of seven months in completing the assessment meant another school year passed without an EHC plan in place to address Z’s urgent need for support."

The Ombudsman report adds: "One weekly morning vocational session, from December 2022 did not, in my view, amount to a full-time suitable education for Z. No other alternative provision, such as home tuition was arranged."

The council was ordered to apologise to Ms Y for its failures. It also had to pay Ms Y £350 to reflect the upset, worry, uncertainty and frustration caused by its failures.

The council was also ordered to pay Ms Y, on Z’s behalf, £4,500 (based on three school terms from November 2022 to November 2023) to "recognise the injustice the missed education has caused them". The council was also told to review its procedures.

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A Derby City Council spokesperson said: “The council does not comment on individual cases. However, we do recognise that there were challenges in assessing and progressing the high volume of Educational Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) received at the time of this case.

“All local authorities, including Derby, have been experiencing challenges in progressing EHCPs, including liaising with schools in relation to educational placements. We accept that in this case that there were significant delays.

“We accepted and took on board the Ombudsman’s findings and recommendations and since have reviewed out systems and processes and made changes accordingly. Capacity in our SEND team has also been increased to reflect the increasing demand for EHCPs and the complex multi-agency approach required to support children and young people with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities. The payment has been made to the family.”

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