Sheffield Council vows never to repeat mistakes after special education failures

The local authority says it will never repeat mistakes which resulted in a Sheffield family receiving £20,000 in compensation because their son failed to have a proper education.
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The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman said the boy, who has Asperger Syndrome, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Pathological Demand Avoidance, and his mother should be compensated for the council’s “catalogue of errors.”

When the 15-year-old could not stay at his first secondary school, the council placed him with a care provider, which was unregistered and unregulated for education.

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The boy left his first secondary school in 2015 and started at a second school in April 2018 but he did not complete a full week’s education until March 2020. The Ombudsman’s found 12 faults with the way the council dealt with the family’s case.

Sheffield Town HallSheffield Town Hall
Sheffield Town Hall

Director of education and skills Andrew Jones, who was not at the council when it happened, said there had been a very sincere apology to the family.

He told a Cabinet meeting: “This is a very critical report and I want to make it clear that we accept all the recommendations. We have already begun implementing some and we will, as quickly as we can, implement all of them in full.

“The decisions that led to this were taken by officers who no longer are with the council but the response that some officers subsequently then took compounded some of those issues.

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“It’s entirely regrettable, and I fully intend to make sure that it doesn’t occur again. The decision to circumnavigate the framework and to use alternative provision is at the heart of this.

“We will emphatically never repeat where an officer makes a decision to provide outside of that framework.”

Tim Armstrong, head of SEN, said the council was committed to improving special education.

“The provision wasn’t good, it wasn’t effective, it wasn’t quality and it shouldn’t have happened.

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“We no longer commission that provider and the young man is now in an independent special school in the local area. Unfortunately, he had to wait quite some time for a place to be available as they had to wait for another child to move out of the provision.

“That was regrettable and was wrong and we should have been able to put the right provision in place.”

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