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England’s special education system is failing, causing thousands of children to have their development put back by months or even years, according to a damning report by the local government ombudsman.
Amerdeep Somal, the local government and social care ombudsman, said her caseload was now dominated by complaints from families involving special educational needs (Sen) provision and schools, with more than 90% of complaints being upheld.
“Our evidence strongly indicates that the system is not working for children, families or local authorities: resources are a challenge, many organisations lack vital staff and in many areas suitable and affordable support does not exist,” Somal said in her triennial review of operations.
“The result is that young people, and their families, don’t get the help they need and lose vital weeks, months and years of education and development as a result. They don’t get that time back.”
Somal expressed frustration that her office was only able to accept complaints about admissions or exclusions involving council-supervised maintained schools, and not those involving state-funded academies or free schools. More than 80% of state secondaries in England are academies, as well as nearly half of all special schools and mainstream primaries.
“This creates an extremely complex landscape where different people have access to different levels of redress depending on which school their child attends, or have no access to redress at all,” Somal said. “This is neither logical nor is it fair.”
Similarly, the ombudsman can only investigate complaints about special needs provision for children assessed for education, health and care plans (EHCPs) but not those with additional needs who do not meet the threshold for a plan.
Somal’s report recommends that the government grant the ombudsman’s office the powers to investigate all state schools over complaints involving EHCPs or additional needs support.
The Department for Education has been contacted for a response.
Complaints about schools and special needs provision accounted for 26% of the local government ombudsman’s cases in 2023-24, with 92% upheld. “A situation where we are upholding nearly 100% of complaints cannot be one that is working for children and their families,” Somal said.
A key failing was the inability of many councils to process applications, or then failure to implement EHCPs after they had been agreed with parents, because of a lack of funding, facilities or qualified staff.
The staff shortages were highlighted by North Yorkshire county council, which could not recruit sufficient education psychologists despite four recruitment rounds and offering higher salaries, leading to long delays in children receiving support.
The ombudsman’s criticisms echo those of the National Audit Office, which recently said the special needs system was “financially unsustainable” in its current form.
Last year, 576,000 children and young people in England had an EHCP, an assessment and agreement detailing the extra support they require, funded from a council’s high-needs budget. A further 1.2 million children are estimated to have special needs but may not qualify for an EHCP.