| SPOTLIGHT |
Hertfordshire County Council has instructed a barrister to carry out an independent review on the effectiveness of its Education Health and Care (EHC) Needs Assessment process.
The launch of the six-week review comes less than six months after the council was issued with an improvement notice following an Ofsted and Care Quality Commission SEND inspection, which found “widespread and systemic failings”.
Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) combine a child’s education, health and social care support into a legal document issued by local authorities in England. Parents can appeal against council refusals to assess a child’s needs or to issue an EHCP.
Data provided by Hertfordshire County Council revealed that since the start of the academic year (September 2023), only 70% of EHCP applications progressed to a needs assessment - meaning almost 1 in 3 did not.
The independent review will therefore focus on how the council internally takes decisions as to whether to assess a child for an EHCP plan when first referred by a parent, school or healthcare professional.
In December last year, the High Court found that Hertfordshire County Council acted unlawfully in failing to complete a finalised EHC plan within the statutory period of 20 weeks.
The claimant challenged the failure of the local authority to discharge its duties to children who may have special educational needs lawfully under the Children and Families Act 2014.
The claimant also raised wider questions about specific aspects of the council’s decision-making process in relation to EHC Needs Assessments. The parent felt that there were systemic failings within the process.
According to the council, the barrister leading the review will have the opportunity to hear from the parent who brought action against the council in relation to his own child, the chair of the council’s SEND improvement board and from representatives of the Hertfordshire Parent and Carers Forum.
A spokesman for Hertfordshire County Council said: “We know from parents and from our recent Ofsted inspection that our SEND services need to improve. That is why, alongside our extensive SEND Improvement Plan, we have commissioned a barrister to review a limited part of our own internal processes and decision making when a request to assess a child’s need is first received. The scope of this work includes but is not limited to how we deal with initial requests for an assessment, how decisions to refuse to assess are taken, and how decisions are reviewed when an appeal is lodged.
“The county council is committed to transparency and we will publish the findings of this independent review so that a constructive dialogue with parents can continue around the delivery of our improvement plans.”
Lottie Winson
