The EHC Plan is a legal document, and the Local Authority must secure the special educational provision specified in the EHC Plan.
If you or your young person are not happy with the finalised EHC Plan and are unable to reach agreement with the local authority, you can appeal against some parts of it to the SEN and Disability Tribunal.
You can appeal against:
• Part B, which describes the child or young person’s SEN,
• Part F which specifies the provision necessary to meet each and very need described in Part B
• or Part I, which names the school or setting the child or young person will attend.
Much of the EHC Plan will be written at a meeting where you as parents, your child or young person, if they are able, will work together with professionals to decide what information on strengths, needs, provision and outcomes should be included in the EHC Plan. Your and your child’s views will be at the centre of the process so you will have a much clearer idea of what your child’s EHC Plan will look like.
After the meeting, the SEN Officer will pull together the information and the outcomes that were decided at the meeting and include those in a draft EHC Plan. This will be sent to you, or your young person if they are over 16 and able to make decisions for themselves, to read and to agree. You will be given 15 days to get back to the local authority about the content of the EHC Plan.
You will also be asked to fill in the name of the particular setting, school or college that you would like to be named in Part I.
Once the EHCP is finalised, you, or your young person if they are over 16 and able to make decisions for themselves, will receive a copy, with a letter explaining what you can do if you are not happy with the finalised plan.
The Local Authority is hoping to introduce this possibility as an a optional way of providing evidence. It would help make the process more person centred. Need to check.
The Local Authority where the child normally lives, also sometimes called the ‘home authority’, is responsible for the child or young person so an Oxfordshire child will have an Oxfordshire EHC Plan.
There is a review process for an EHC Plan. It will be reviewed annually if a child is over five. For children 0 – 5 the local authority should consider reviewing the EHC plan every three to six months as a young child can change so much in a short time.
If there is a sudden change in a child or young person’s learning needs, you could request an interim review of your child’s EHC Plan
If there are specific changes to a child’s health or circumstances that mean the health or social provision need changing, the EHC Plan can be amended without a full review or re-assessment.
Your child or young person is at the centre of this process so their views and hopes for the future are very important and hopefully with support many of them will be able to express their views.
Obviously for some children or young people expressing their wishes themselves isn’t possible, but there are other ways of including their views, their dislikes. You and their brothers or sisters know them best and can fill in the ‘All About Me’ and help others understand what they need.
There may be options to include videos or make a wiki which show what is important for your child or young person.
A child or young person’s school or setting can make a request, as can a parent. Under the new law, a young person (16-25) can also make a request themselves.
In making its decision about whether a child or young person needs an EHC Needs assessment the local authority has to look at what support has already been provided and whether there has been any progress. If a school or setting makes the request, they will able to provide evidence of support, attainment and rate of progress.
If you as a parent, or your young person make a request. please read the Education, Health and Care Needs assessment leaflet which gives you some suggestions about the sort of reports and meeting notes that you could send in to support your request.
The Code of Practice says that provision must be detailed and specific and should normally be quantified, for example, in terms of the type, hours and frequency of support and level of expertise. There should be an emphasis on ‘outcomes’ i.e. what your child wants to be able to do or achieve, so the level of support needed will be tailored to helping them making progress towards the outcomes.
