Nearly 1,000 Children Waiting for Educational Help & Care Plans in Surrey

Published on: 14 Dec, 2022
Updated on: 15 Dec, 2022

By Emily Coady-Stemp

local democracy reporter

A senior Surrey councillor admits it is “not good enough” that nearly 1,000 children with special educational needs in Surrey are waiting for an education plan.

Nearly a third of those have been waiting more than the statutory 20-week limit for an Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP), with a shortage in educational psychologists among the reasons the council put forward for the backlog.

Surrey County Council’s cabinet member for education and learning said nationally, for 60 per cent of children being assessed for an EHCP, it was being done within the 20-week period.

Cllr Clare Curran

Clare Curran (Conservative, Bookham and Fetcham West) added: “Clearly it is not only a situation that prevails here in Surrey.

“Notwithstanding the national situation, I admit that it’s not good enough and not one that we would expect or want for our young people.”

An EHCP is put together by a council for children to outline what help they may need at school to support them with their special education needs and disabilities.

There are 988 active EHCP requests at the council, of which 284 were known to be over the 20-week period, according to meeting documents.

Cllr Curran explained to a meeting of Surrey’s council on Tuesday (December 13) that a shortage of educational psychologists meant a mandatory part of the EHCPs could not be completed, which was contributing to delays.

She said recruiting and training caseworkers had been a focus, and the workforce was now around 80 per cent staffed across the county.

Her answers came in response to a question put forward by Lance Spencer (Lib Dem, Goldsworth East and Horsell Village) who said families were being “left behind” by the council and asked what was being done to reduce the “excessive delays”.

Cllr Curran said that the council’s ambition was to achieve “better timeliness” by the end of the year in completing EHCP plans.

She added: “I know the situation is not good. I know we are not achieving the level of service that we would want to for our children and young people.

“We are doing our very best to address that and make sure that things improve.”

In a written response, the council denied that parents threatening legal action sped up the timescale for getting an EHCP in place.

Cllr Spencer’s written question read: “It would appear that where the parents threaten legal action the EHCP timescales are reduced” and asked for the number of parents who had written threatening legal proceedings.

A written response said data was not collected at the council in that way, adding: “This process is not influenced by the threat of legal proceedings.”

The meeting heard that the issues impacting the outstanding EHCPs were also a factor in nearly a fifth of annual reviews not being carried out within six months of their due date.

A question put forward by Catherine Baart (Green, Earlswood and Reigate South) asked for an update on annual EHCP reviews at the authority.

The response in meeting documents showed that at the start of term, 59 per cent of plans had an up-to-date annual review in place or were due within the next month, being 6,445 of the 10,963 plans in place.

There were also 4,517 plans that were overdue a review, of which 1,849 were more than six months overdue.

Documents said the availability of staff over the summer had played a part in fewer annual reviews being completed on time, and that an improvement should be seen by the end of the autumn term.

Cllr Curran said she did not know if there was a target within the department for completing reviews on time, but that the service was prioritising reviews for children who were vulnerable, including those looked after by the county council or on child protection plans.

Councillors also raised the issue of home-to-school transport in Surrey, described as “the biggest concern of many of our residents” by the Green Party Group leader on the council.

The council’s leader, Cllr Tim Oliver (Con, Weybridge) apologised in October for a backlog in sorting school transport for some of the county’s most vulnerable children, when more than 150 families were left in limbo at the start of term.

Jonathan Essex (Green, Redhill East) called on the council to look in its review at the views put forward Family Voice Surrey which had spoken to 290 families as part of its own review.

Cllr Nick Darby (Residents, The Dittons) told the meeting the internal review listed more than 50 recommendations for the council, which he described as “a terrible indictment of the situation”.

He said the school transport was “best described as a shambles” and questioned the creation of a new board to oversee progress being made up of officers and cabinet members, many of them previously involved in the process.

On Thursday (December 15) a meeting of the council’s children, families, lifelong learning and culture select committee will consider the council’s review of what happened at the start of the school year.

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