SEN statement amendments

[Mummy2Jellybean]

To cut a very long and depressing story short , my sons SEN school was not meeting his needs or following his statement of SEN.
I begged for help and then complained for a year before having to take him out due to the damage it was causing him. I complained to both the school (independent SEN school) and the LA who were paying for the placement. Complaint wasn’t addressed and is now with the ombudsman.
He left the school in October and his annual review was in November. We only had his amended statement a few weeks ago which failed to include important medical information. We have asked for amendments twice which they failed to do.
We still don’t have his final statement so can’t take it to tribunal.
During this time we have had promises of placements at suitable schools which then got retracted- we were told they were full and could no longer take him. We want to go to tribunal to fight for a place at school we were told was full.
The LA asked for an educational psychology assessment 2 weeks ago and are now saying that they can’t send a final statement until this is done. It just feels like a time delaying tactic. Their suggestions of schools are ridiculous and I am confident that this will be evident at tribunal.
My question is, is there a legal timeframe for the local authority in terms of issuing an amended and then final statement? Am I right in thinking 7 months after the statement review meeting and leaving school is too long?

Are you in Wales or NI?

If the Statement of SEN wasn't followed at the time you could have gone to Judicial Review.

There's no statutory timescales for making the amendments other than it must be "without delay", but I believe the LA should send the final statement within 8 weeks of the draft being sent to you.

If you are in Wales SNAP Cymru have a model letter you can use to chase the LA if they miss this deadline. If you are in NI SENAC can help.

Thank you. We are in Wales.
I’ve used Snap before and wasn’t that impressed. They were nice but not at all forceful with LA even though they were doing wrong, so I decided I was better off on my own. They were a bit like a go between and I felt like they protected the LA.
The thing is the draft wasn’t sent until 7 months after he left his school and had a review that it wasn’t suitable. Prior to that I’d had another review where I stressed the school was no longer suitable or meeting his needs. So all this time he has only had 1 hour tuition a week.

Even if DS is out of school the LA are still responsible for providing what is in the Statement, and definitely more than 1 hour a week. Write to the LA complaining and threatening Judicial Review if you do not put something in place ASAP while DS is out of school.

Unfortunately, at this point you can't force the LA to act faster because legally they have 8 weeks to finalise from sending you the draft. Despite SNAP Cymru being unhelpful previously their model letters are useful.