A SEND child was left without full-time education for a year due to council fault, an investigation has found.
Wokingham Borough Council (WBC) was found at fault by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGO) for delaying appropriate education provision and failing to communicate with the child's mother effectively.
The complainant, who is referred to as Miss X in the report, said that the council delayed securing a suitable education placement for her son who has special educational needs. This had a detrimental impact on their family life, disrupting routines in their household.
A report from the LGO found the local authority refused an offer from a prospective school multiple times because another school had been put on her son’s Education, Health and Care plan. This is a document that identifies a child’s particular needs and what additional support they require.
It began when her son, Y, was suspended from a school for two days in September 2022, which prompted him to stop attending the school and require a new placement.
WBC then sent consultations to three schools where they thought Y could be placed. But Miss X was unhappy that so few settings had been considered, so the council sent out more and arranged Maths and English tuition for her son in February 2023.
Wokingham Borough Council then selected a ‘School 1’ for Y two months later, putting this into her son’s EHC plan. The following month, another school, ‘School 2’ offered Y a place, but the council’s SEND panel decided that they could not make an informed decision on the offer until a response had been received from all settings.
Miss X then complained that her son had been out of school for nearly a year, and the council had refused the offer from School 2 multiple times. But WBC said it would reconsider School 2’s offer after all consultees had responded.
WBC informed the parent she could have appealed the decision when she received the final EHC plan.
Her son eventually secured a place in School 2 which commenced in September 2023, leaving him out of education for a year in total.
The report finds that the council published the boy’s EHC plan nearly eight weeks later than it should have. Although some educational provision was given to Y, this was not equivalent to what he should have been given on a full-time basis.
WBC has agreed to apologise, finalise and issue the EHC plan, and to pay a total of £4,350 in remedies.
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