Derbyshire council faces worrying SEND challenges like many nationwide, according to watchdog

Derbyshire council says it is working hard to improve its services for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) during a ‘difficult time’ as the National Audit Office has stated government steps will not be enough to address the many SEND challenges faced by local authorities nationwide.

The county council has been accused in a Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman review letter of errors leading to around a quarter of a million pounds in compensation having to be paid to families with children with special educational needs and of having a poor complaints response record.

Over the last year, from March 2023, to March 2024, the review revealed 55 complaints were investigated by the Ombudsman and 47 were upheld. This led to a total of more than £230,000 being paid in compensation to families which had increased from £36,000 in the previous year.

However, the report acknowledged the financial challenges and service demands faced by councils and now the public spending watchdog, the National Audit Office, has stressed in a report that the national SEND system is financially ‘unsustainable’, in ‘urgent need of reform’ and is ‘broken’.

County Cllr Alex Dale, Cabinet Member for Education, told a recent cabinet meeting: “We have been very clear publicly and transparently, we are going through a very difficult time with these services.”

He added: “We are working hard to make things better and there are a number of improvements in several different areas to improve things and there is still a lot of work to do and it is far from complete.”

The council has hundreds of thousands of direct contacts with residents every year and in 2023/24 Children’s Services upheld the largest percentage of complaints.

A report on complaints and compliments made to the council during 2023/24 and trend analysis for the last eight years showed 615 compliments and 1,159 complaints were received in Children’s Services and 47.4 per cent of complaints were upheld or partially upheld.

And the council recorded the response times for these matters was 39.9 per cent within a target time.

If a complaint is not resolved and the complainant remains dissatisfied, they can refer the complaint to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.

Of the 47 upheld decisions by the Ombudsman, it was found the council had provided a satisfactory remedy in just 6 per cent of the cases before the complaint reached the Ombudsman.

Furthermore, 40 per cent of the council’s responses to the Ombudsman watchdog were late, with the authority citing staff shortages and a “substantial” increase in complaints as the reasons for delays.  

But the scale of work faced by the Conservative-led council is evidenced by over 6,000 Educational Health Care Plans (EHCPs) on its books, which has doubled in the past few years, and it has said that as of August it had already received 7,100 requests for EHCPs.

Most of the complaints raised with the council and then the Ombudsman – due to insufficient remedies by the council – relate to delays in handling EHCPs meaning children either go to school without sufficient support or remain out of school for months, entire terms and years.  

Cllr Dale stressed the significant number of complaints received by the council is not surprising but the authority is trying to improve its own system while facing a huge rise in demand and requests for services – like many other councils across the country – and it is a national issue.

Government funding has actually risen by 58 per cent to £10.7bn, with an estimated 1.7 million children with special needs in schools in England. However, the National Audit Office has warned the system is financially ‘unsustainable’, in ‘urgent need of reform’ and is ‘broken’.

The recent NAO report has also warned that two-fifths of councils could be at risk of declaring bankruptcy by March 2026, because they are overspending on higher-needs budgets.

Derbyshire County Council is addressing an estimated budget deficit for the current 2024/25 financial year of over £39m, with controversial saving plans, and it has highlighted and blamed rising costs and demands with children’s and adults’ care services among a number of external influences.

Deputy Leader, Cllr Simon Spencer, who is the Cabinet Member for Corporate Services and Budget, has said the increasing demand for services, particularly in Adult Social Care and Children’s Services and safeguarding, is an ongoing challenge that requires intervention from the new Labour government.

The NAO report’s lead author, Emma Wilson, has stated none of the steps taken by the government will address ‘the significant challenges that the system faces’ and she adds that the NAO concludes ‘the current system is broken’ and needs a ‘whole system reform’.

It is also not known by the Department for Education how many spaces will be needed in schools and other settings for children with SEND in the future, according to the NAO.

The NAO has also recommended schools need a plan to be more ‘inclusive’ for SEND youngsters, but there are limited incentives in this area because school performance continues to be measured on academic attainment and exam results.

However, the government is soon planning to introduce a qualitative and more subjective report card system to replace the single-phrase Ofsted result findings such as ‘Outstanding’, ‘Good’, and ‘Requires Improvement’.

Another concern is that some schools have a smaller number of special needs youngsters, according to one school in Leeds, because they are not able to meet special needs’ requirements. The NAO says many special schools nationally are also full, which creates further difficulties.

The National Association of Headteachers General Secretary, Paul Whiteman, fears matters may get worse and that the system may even face collapse.

Headteachers and councils are calling for the government to consider more SEND funding and for councils’ high-needs budget deficits to be written-off as part of the autumn budget. They also want the government to consider extending the deal to separate high-needs deficits form overall council budgets.

To address SEND concerns, Derbyshire County Council has introduced a digital case management system called iDOX to improve efficiency with children’s EHCP assessments and communication between the council, families, schools, health and other agencies.

This technology is part of a £1m investment the council recently made in its SEND service with a redesign, a new team set-up, additional staff and specialist training.

The council has also invested £11m to create 500 additional special needs school places and it has also remodelled other services within its schools and learning service to develop the inclusive capacity of mainstream schools and set up an SEND Coordinator Network and an SENDCo Helpline.

Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission recently completed a Local Area SEND inspection of the system-wide partnership including the county council, health services and schools and their report is expected to be published this autumn.

Cllr Dale said the council acknowledges it must do significantly better and it is making progress with its efforts to reduce delays in addressing issues and he believes things will start to improve and the council will continue to work hard and listen to parents.

He added: “While there’s plenty of hard work still ahead, we’re already making progress on several fronts and as with the Ombudsman’s Letter, we’ll use the outcome of our Local Area SEND inspection to further develop and strengthen our services across the partnership and will continue driving forward with improvements.”

Cllr Dale also told the recent Cabinet meeting: “This is something we are actually aware of and we acknowledge it’s not good enough but we are doing a huge amount of work.”

Government Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has said she recognises the pressure on councils and she is determined to turn the national SEND situation around but it will take time.