New children and education complaint decisions

View online A weekly update on children and education complaint decisions Please note: our decisions are published six weeks after they are issued to councils, care providers and the person who has made the complaint. The cases below reflect the caselaw and guidance available at the time of issue and the individual circumstances of each case. Norfolk County Council (19 016 828) Summary: Mr X complained after the Council stopped providing alternative education for his daughter, D at home. He said D was not well enough to return to school for alternative provision and the Council's decision left him with no choice but to electively home educate. The Council was at fault in how it ended D's home tuition, however that fault did not cause D an injustice. Staffordshire County Council (19 011 998) Summary: Ms J complains the Council failed to provide education to her son, K, throughout 2019. K was not attending school and the Council decided to prosecute her for his non-attendance. This caused her distress and K missed a service he was entitled to receive. When she made complaints, the Council failed to deal with them in a timely way causing time and trouble. The investigation found evidence of fault in failing to provide K with education from September to December 2019. It also found evidence of fault in the Council's complaints handling. Archbishop Beck Catholic College (20 000 531) Summary: We upheld Mr X's complaint about an unsuccessful school appeal for his son, Y. The panel did not ensure Y's mother could take part in the hearing. This caused uncertainty the panel had all the information it needed to make an informed decision. The Admission Authority will offer a fresh appeal for Y, ensuring both parents can take part. East Riding of Yorkshire Council (20 002 298) Summary: Miss V complained an independent appeal panel had failed to act fairly when considering her daughter, W's, case for a place at the school of her choice. This caused huge distress to Miss V and W. The Council has agreed to convene a fresh appeal panel, with a new clerk, to hear the case. Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council (20 007 166) Summary: We will not investigate Mr X's complaint about the Council's children's services' involvement at this time. This is because the courts are currently involved, and the scope of our investigation and any assessment of injustice caused to the family relies on the outcome of the court process. It is open to Mr X to bring his complaint back to us after those proceedings have finished. Southampton City Council (19 014 061) Summary: Mr S complained, through his representative, the Council failed to properly plan for his release from custody and failed to support him as a child in need. This caused him distress because he did not have a suitable address or support plan, which would have allowed him to take advantage of early release. He did not have a permanent address or full-time education in place from his automatic release date even though he was only fifteen years of age at the time. There is evidence of fault by the Council and it has been asked to apologise, make payments and amend its procedures so it begins planning for children's releases earlier. Worcestershire County Council (19 019 934) Summary: The Council failed to keep Mr X's status as a Child in Need under review. It also failed to consider whether Mr X qualified for advice and assistance when he turned 18. The Council has now agreed to provide this support. It should also apologise and pay Mr X £5000. Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council (19 008 029) Summary: Mrs X complained about the Council's lack of support for her children, A and B, who have special educational needs. The Council was at fault for a delay in issuing an amended Education Health and Care plan for A in early 2019, a delay in providing a listening device for A, the failure to ensure all the speech and language provision in A's plan was delivered between April and September 2019, and the failure to identify a specialist dyslexia tutor for both boys. It should pay Mrs X £1,000 to remedy the frustration and time and trouble the faults caused her, and the injustice and uncertainty the lack of support caused the boys. Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council (19 018 061) Summary: Mr B, complains the Council has failed to deliver suitable support for his children's special educational needs and to reassess their needs. He also complains the Council failed to respond to his complaints. The Council delayed reassessing and issuing Mr B's children with new Education, Health, and Care plans, this caused injustice to Mr B and his children. The Council has agreed to issue the children's Education, Health and Care plans within one week of this decision and to make a financial remedy to Mr B for the delay. Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council (20 002 315) Summary: The Council was not at fault for delaying a review of an Education, Health and Care plan, as it is permitted to do this under the Coronavirus Regulations. The Council was at fault for failing to provide the complainant with a corrected version of the plan in July 2019, but this did not cause an injustice. The Council was also at fault for failing to register a complaint about these matters, which caused an injustice it has agreed to remedy. The Council has also agreed to take steps to ensure this fault does not recur. Royal Borough of Greenwich (20 003 831) Summary: The Ombudsman will discontinue Mrs B complaint that the Council delayed issuing her son's final EHC Plan. This is because it is not possible to assess the extent of any injustice until the provision he should have been receiving is known. A Tribunal is currently deciding this. St Philip's Catholic Primary School, Stockport (20 003 872) Summary: There was fault in the way an appeal panel considered an application for a school place in that it incorrectly applied law relating to infant class sizes to an application for a place in year 5. This casts doubt on the decision the panel reached. Mr X has now been offered a fresh appeal to remedy the injustice caused. Recommendations for an apology and service improvements are also made. Telford & Wrekin Council (19 009 991) Summary: There is no evidence of fault by the Council in how it considered Miss X's complaints about the welfare of her son and the use of his disability living allowance by his foster carers. Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council (19 016 692) Summary: Mrs X complains about the Council's decision to place all four of her and her wife, Mrs Y's children on a child protection plan. She also complains the Council gave false information to her and her wife's employers and lacked impartiality, favouring one child's views over the wishes and feelings of the other three children. We cannot question the merits of the decisions the Council has made there is no evidence of fault. Essex County Council (19 020 833) Summary: Mrs X complained the Council failed to deal with her safeguarding concerns about her grandchildren. The Council was at fault in delaying statutory visits and delaying or failing to conduct risk assessments. This caused Mrs X significant distress about the safety of her grandchildren. The Council will take action to remedy this injustice. Kingston Upon Hull City Council (20 006 602) Summary: We will not investigate Mr X's complaint about the Council holding inaccurate information about him and having shared this information with others, including during court proceedings. We cannot investigate what happened in court. The Information Commissioner's Office is better placed to consider issues relating to accuracy and sharing of information. Cheshire East Council (20 005 970) Summary: Mr X complained about the Council's actions before and during care proceedings in court. We cannot investigate the complaint because we cannot investigate legal proceedings. Portsmouth City Council (20 006 804) Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Miss B's complaint that Council officers have lied in the course of care proceedings, and have declined to give her support during her pregnancy. This is because the law prevents us investigating what happens in court, and we cannot achieve the outcome Miss B wants. Bedford Borough Council (20 003 533) Summary: Mrs X complains the Council failed to make provision for her language difficulties, excluded her from a meeting and failed to take her views on her daughter into account. She also says the Council's complaint handling was inadequate. The Council is at fault and has agreed a financial remedy and an apology. Buckinghamshire County Council (18 014 794) Summary: Mrs B complains the Council has not dealt with her daughter Miss X's Special Educational Needs properly. The Council did not follow statutory timescales, did not obtain reports in time and did not deal with Mrs B safeguarding complaint properly. Mrs B incurred costs to obtain independent reports, did not receive a proper response to her complaint about safeguarding and suffered distress. Miss X's right to appeal was delayed and she missed support. The Council has agreed to apologise to Mrs B, pay Mrs B £200 for her time, trouble and avoidable distress, pay Mrs B £600 for the delay and Miss X's missed provision and £1050 for the independent reports she had to provide and review how SEND assessments requests are communicated and actioned. Birmingham City Council (19 010 683) Summary: Mr and Mrs X complained the Council failed to arrange alternative education for their son Y, amend his Education Health and Care plan and arrange a new school place after he was permanently excluded from school in February 2019. We find the Council was at fault for failing to review Y's Education Health and Care plan, delaying arranging a new school place and in how it dealt with Mr and Mrs X's complaint. The Council has agreed to pay a financial remedy to Mr and Mrs X for the uncertainty and frustration caused by its faults and to issue a final amended Education Health and Care plan without delay. Hampshire County Council (19 018 395) Summary: there was fault by Hampshire County Council in its handling of X's post 16 transfer to sixth form college from late 2018 in the form of delay. The Council also failed to make the speech and occupational therapy provision detailed in X's EHC plan for the autumn term in 2019. This fault caused X and his mother, Ms B, injustice and the Council will take the action recommended to recognise this. Norfolk County Council (20 001 312) Summary: Mr B complains the Council delayed issuing his son with an Education, Health and Care plan, and he had to meet the cost of his son's provision during the delay. We have found fault with the Council for its delay issuing Mr B's son's Education, Health and Care plan. The Council has agreed to take action to remedy the injustice to Mr and his son. East Sussex County Council (20 002 107) Summary: Mrs X complains about the Council's decision to decline her travel assistance application for her son. She says the Council did not properly consider the available information and did not properly consider the financial cost of paying for a person to drive her son to college. She also complains about delays in the Council considering her appeal. We find fault with the Council for making an assumption about the miles per gallon a wheelchair accessible vehicle could achieve. The Council has provided a suitable remedy and no further remedy is appropriate as there is no ongoing injustice. Wokingham Borough Council (19 013 571) Summary: The Council did not deal with Mr B's complaint about an initial child protection case conference properly: it delayed in its consideration under the statutory children's complaints procedure and took too long to reach a decision that it did not qualify for this procedure as it related to matters related to accuracy of data on its files. It also delayed before taking action subsequently recommended by the Information Commissioner's Office London Borough of Bromley (19 014 754) Summary: We upheld Miss B's complaint about how the Council handled her complaint about children's social care. The Council took 66 weeks longer than it should have to respond to her complaint. This caused frustration and uncertainty for Miss B. To remedy the injustice caused, the Council agreed to explain to Miss B what service improvements it has made, make a payment to recognise the impact of the faults identified, and arrange more training for staff. Wolverhampton City Council (19 018 077) Summary: Mrs X says the Council unfairly refused to complete adaptations to her home for her disabled daughter, D. She says this caused her and D an injustice as D's movements around their home are restricted by its current structure. There was some fault in the process the Council initially followed, for which it has apologised. This caused confusion and upset. But the Council has since proposed other reasonable adaptations to Mrs X's home. There has been some unnecessary delay in implementing some of the adaptations Mrs X has agreed to. This has caused some injustice as D's movement has been restricted. We have made some recommendations to acknowledge this and to help provide resolution. But the Council is not at fault in its approach in other respects. Durham County Council (20 001 887) Summary: The Ombudsman cannot investigate Miss X's complaint about the contents of the Council's court reports because it lies outside his jurisdiction. The law prevents the Ombudsman from investigating matters that have been considered in court proceedings. Blackburn with Darwen Council (20 005 603) Summary: The Ombudsman cannot investigate Mr C's complaint about the Council's actions and decisions regarding the care of his grandson. This is because the complaint concerns matters which have been decided in court. North Yorkshire County Council (20 007 317) Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr B's complaint that the Council was late in providing him with a copy of an assessment. This is because investigation could not establish that fault on the Council's part caused the injustice Mr B claims. London Borough of Lambeth (19 012 432) Summary: the Council delayed transferring Mr B's daughter's statement of special educational needs to an education, health and care plan, delayed carrying out updated assessments, delayed carrying out an annual review, failed to share the education, health and care plan or information about high needs funding with the college, delayed completing a social care assessment and delayed responding to a complaint. As a result Mr B's daughter missed out on special educational needs provision between 2017 and 2019 and Mr B had to go to time and trouble to pursue his complaint. An apology and a financial payment is satisfactory remedy. Rutland County Council (19 017 675) Summary: The complainant, Mrs Y, says the Council's Home to School Transport policy is unclear and poorly worded. As a result, she was unaware that her two children, who both have Special Educational Needs (SEN), were eligible for transport assistance. The Ombudsman finds no fault with the policies in question. When read in full, the policies provide enough information to allow parents to enquire about, or apply for, transport assistance. St Bede's Catholic High School, Ormskirk (20 001 337) Summary: Miss X complained about the arrangements for her appeal for a place for her son at the School. We find there was fault in failing to send her a notice of the hearing which caused her to miss out on putting questions to the appeal panel. There was also fault in the way the panel decided on the format of the appeal under the temporary COVID-19 rules. Miss X has already been offered another hearing. We recommend some changes in procedure. London Borough of Camden (19 011 274) Summary: Ms X complains the Council failed to provide the correct financial support to her as a foster carer. We have found no evidence of fault in the way the Council paid Ms X a foster carers allowance. But there was fault in its failure to provide clarity over Ms X's status as a specialist foster carer during the complaint procedure. We have suggested a suitable remedy and so are completing our investigation. Redcar & Cleveland Council (19 018 436) Summary: Ms X complained the Council stopped her Special Guardianship Allowance in 2016 although she was experiencing financial hardship at the time. During our investigation, the Council admitted it acted with fault. It has awarded Ms X £22,300 in back payments. This is satisfactory to remedy the injustice the Council caused her. The Council has also agreed to carry out an audit of special guardians to ensure others have not been affected by the same fault. Gloucestershire County Council (20 007 642) Summary: We cannot investigate Ms X's complaint about a report the Council wrote for court. This is because the law prevents us from considering what happened in court. We look at individual complaints about local public services and all registerable social care providers in England. We remedy injustice and share learning from investigations to improve services. When we find a council or care provider has done something wrong, we recommend how it should put it right. We are free to use and make our decisions independently. Find out more about us at www.lgo.org.uk Manage preferences or unsubscribe Contact us

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