Council pays £5.4k over child who missed education

The nine-year-old should have had alternative education, the ombudsman said

A council has paid £5,400 and apologised to a family after a nine-year-old girl was out of school for 19 months.

She first stopped going to school in April 2021 because she was experiencing significant anxiety, a report said.

The Local Government Ombudsman said West Northamptonshire Council should have put alternative education in place by May 2022.

The council accepted the findings and said it was "sorry" it did not provide the right service.

According to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, the ombudsman was told a draft Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) was issued for the girl in March 2022.

The council said she could be taught in a mainstream setting despite her mother's request for an Education Other Than at School (EOTAS) package.

In September 2022, after the original EHCP was taken to mediation, the council agreed to provide an EOTAS budget for the family.

The girl's mother received the first payment 19 months after her daughter was initially taken out of school, in November.

'Distress and frustration'

The ombudsman said the council should have issued a final EHCP in January 2022 rather than in August, more than 27 weeks late.

No means of education was provided during this time.

The ombudsman said: "The council failed to recognise that it had a duty to provide [the girl] with alternative education."

The report said this would have affected the girl's "development and well-being".

It ordered the council to pay £5,100 for not providing suitable education and another £300 for the mother's "distress and frustration".

Fiona Baker, Conservative cabinet member for children, families, education and skills at the council, said the local authority was working to improve the "timeliness and quality" of EHCPs.

She said the council recently brought "in a team of educational psychologists to reduce the number of overdue EHCP assessments".

There was a 40% increase in requests for EHCPs over the last three years which was "considerably higher than that faced by other councils", she explained.