Somerset County Council fined for delayed education plan

Somerset County Council admitted it should have published the boy's new care plan sooner

Somerset County Council has paid £2,000 in compensation for failing to provide adequate schooling for a young boy with special educational needs.

The boy missed months of extra help when the council delayed publication of his new care plan, which had been agreed by his mother and his school.

His mother complained to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, which found in her favour.

The council accepted the ruling and has since apologised to the family.

The boy was referred to as Mr Y in the report and his mother as Miss X.

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Under English law, if a child has an EHC plan it must be reviewed at least annually. However, it is not law that every child with SEND must have a an EHCP.

Mr Y's EHCP was reviewed in May 2021 and the council informed Miss X that it would change the plan, the Local Democracy Reporting Service said.

Under national guidelines published by the Department for Education (DfE), the council has to issue the new EHCP within eight weeks of the review.

However, in Mr Y's case the updated plan was not released until the end of October 2021, meaning he missed five months of specialist provision.

In November 2021, Miss Y lodged an appeal to the council's SEND tribunal - more than three months after she had been legally entitled to do so. The tribunal concluded that Mr Y required a mixture of one-to-one support, work in small groups and being taught as part of a whole class.

Miss X contended this could not be delivered under his current EHCP placement.

The ombudsman concluded the council had not issued Mr Y's EHCP on time, had allowed Mr Y to miss several months of schooling and had failed to work with Miss X to allow her to make her appeal in a timely fashion.

The ombudsman ordered the council to pay Miss X a total of £2,000 - £1,300 for the delays she experienced in her tribunal appeal and £700 in reflection of her son's missed SEN provision.

A council spokesman said: "We have accepted the ruling from the LGSCO and apologise to the family involved.

"We confirm that all actions have been completed, including reminding officers of the importance of the statutory time-scales relating to Education, Health and Care plans.

"We have made significant improvements in our EHCP processes and we are committed to continued improvements."