Parents, carers and young people can appeal to the SEND tribunal about decisions that the local authority has made about your child or young person or young adult up to 25 years old. You can also appeal to the SEND tribunal about disability discrimination about schools, educational establishments and local authorities.
The tribunal can now make non-binding recommendations about the health and social care aspects of education, health and care plans (EHCP), as well as the education aspects. This gives you the opportunity to raise all your concerns about an education, health and care plan in one place.
It is only possible for the tribunal to consider the health and/or social care aspects of the education, health and care plan if you are already making an appeal in relation to the education aspects of the plan, and the education aspect must remain live throughout the appeal.
Standard appeals to the SEND tribunal
The kind of decisions you can appeal against include refusal to carry out a statutory assessment, and refusal to make an education, health and care plan.
In regard to schools, you can make a claim of disability discrimination under the Equality Act 2010 if your child is disabled within the meaning of the Act (not all children with special educational needs are disabled) and you feel they have been discriminated against.
Appeals you might make
You might ask the tribunal to:
- assess your child's educational, health and care (EHC) needs
- reassess their special educational needs
- create an educational, health and care plan (EHCP)
- change the educational, health and care plan
- reject or stop the educational, health and care plan
For someone under 18 and in custody, you can appeal if:
- the council doesn't make an educational, health and care needs assessment
- the council doesn't think an educational, health and care plan is needed after an assessment
- the school or other institution that they'll attend once they're released isn't suitable
You can also appeal to the tribunal if a school or local authority has discriminated against your child or someone else because of your child's disability, such as if they haven't provided support.
You can find more about appealing to the SEND tribunal at GOV.UK.
Mediation
Mediation provides an opportunity for us to resolve disagreements and it can be completed more quickly than an appeal.
Before you can register an appeal with the tribunal, you must contact a mediation adviser within two months of the local authority decision you wish to appeal and consider whether mediation might be a way to resolve your disagreement with the local authority.
If you want to appeal only about the school or other institution named in the educational, health and care plan you do not have to contact a mediation adviser.
You can go to mediation about the health and social care elements of an educational, health and care plan, but this is not compulsory. You can request recommendations about health and social care issues without having to receive mediation advice or attend mediation about those issues, provided there is also an education issue about which you are appealing.
If mediation resolves the educational issues, you will not be able to appeal to the tribunal on any health and/or social care aspects of the educational, health and care plan. This does not affect your right to make an educational appeal, and some aspects of the disagreement can go to appeal even when other aspects are resolved.
Once a mediation adviser has been contacted, or once you have taken part in mediation, you will be issued with a certificate. This will be necessary if you are still unhappy and wish to progress to an appeal with the tribunal. An appeal to the tribunal must usually be made within two months of the decision about which the appeal is being made or one month following the issuing of the mediation certificate, whichever is later.
Request a health or social care recommendation
If you wish to appeal against a local authority decision on any of the grounds above and want to request that the tribunal considers your concerns about the health and/or social care aspects of the education, health and care plan, you should follow the normal process for bringing an appeal to the tribunal and tick the box on the form relating to a health and / or social care appeal.
Extra advice and resources
- Legal advice on matters relating to education and special educational needs is also available from the Coram Children's Legal Centre
- More advice and resources can be found from the Independent Parental Special Educational Advice website