Council pays over £500,000 for failures

Fines paid out by Surrey County Council for repeatedly failing children and young people topped £500,000 over the last year.

The amount is more than double that paid out for the previous year.

The figures, reported by the Local Democracy Reporting Service. have been released ahead of the meeting of the authority's audit and governance committee on Wednesday.

The council said it was working hard to improve services.

The council paid £540,611.59 to families who raised complaints through the children and social care watchdog.

It is an increase of £281,880, or 109%, on the figures up to June 2023.

Part of the increase is due to a change in guidance from the Ombudsman, which encourages local authorities to provide financial remedies earlier, as well as on an ongoing basis for delays to education, health and care (EHC) plans.

'Missed provision'

The council said it had reduced the number of delayed EHC plan requests from 1,658 in October 2023 to about 100 by the end of May 2024 , and is on track to eliminate the backlog altogether.

Dr Julia Katherine, Surrey County Council’s interim director of education and lifelong learning said: “We are working hard to reduce spend on fines, which we know is higher than it should be.

“However, we recognise that delays in issuing EHC plans have also contributed to missed provision and subsequent fines, and we apologise for any distress caused to the children and families affected.

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