Reports for EHCP- right to see them?

[FrayedHem]

DS1's statement transfer is underway. I had a bit of a struggle to get the EP involved; one did attend a meeting at school a couple of weeks after the transfer meeting. He did refuse to actually meet DS1, but went through the paperwork, made suggested amendments to the drafted EHCP and was going to do a report.

I just chased up the EP report and was told the SEN case officer would send it with the EHCP in due course. As the EHCP won't be issued until February, I would like to see a copy before then. Do I have the right to request it?

Send the EP/LA and email informing them of your grave concern over those words (quote date time and place) and notify them of your formal request to have a change of EP do a full assessment as is required by law.

Thanks Starlight, I know I should do exactly that. I'm just not sure if I should wait to see if we get the placement we want first. I'm seriously thinking everything through at the moment.

It sounds like the EP still has no idea of the law - as Starlight says, the law is very clear that there has to be a full assessment, and looking at the papers and changing bits of wording here and there clearly doesn't constitute doing an assessment. Does your child have language, motor or sensory problems, and if so has the LA sorted out SALT and OT assessments?

I suppose it could well be the case that you may be better off letting sleeping dogs lie, on the basis that if you have to go to appeal the LA evidence will be appalling so if you can get your own independent reports they will carry yet more weight.

The local charity you mentioned sounds like one in our area which makes a big deal about how they have the ear of the council's education department and are working with them to make everything wonderful for parents. The reality is that they are a positive danger because they don't know what the law is and there is a widespread perception that they are so deeply into the LA's pockets that they're not to be trusted.

IME, EPs commissioned by LA will write their reports based on what's in the best financial interests of the LA, rather than what's in the best interests of the child. That goes for other professionals as well. I've yet to encounter one that hasn't fought to cut provision at any given opportunity.

SerendiptyPhenomenon it was quoting the law to the LA that brought the EP into action. He genuinely seemed surprised by it, but is now fully aware. The one thing I will say for my LA is a lot of their documents are available online. I've managed to find their guide to SENCos and even in that they say if there hasn't been an EP report for 2-3 years a new assessment is needed. So they aren't even sticking to their own made up guidelines!
DS1 was seen by SALT until the end of YR and I was in agreement to have him signed off. He had a one-off OT assessment following his DX. Although he does have some difficulties in those areas, I have always felt the Specialist Teacher input has been the most useful. SOS!SEN suggested getting a private SALT report but I'm still considering that.

The charity has really disappointed me. I used them previously for help with DLA and also for help with his first (awful) school, so to have them ignoring the law and siding with the EP really shocked me. It seems to me to be another point in which the LA are cutting parents off; if I took them at their word I would be thinking I was very lucky to get an EP to come to a meeting at all.

zen1 this is the crux of the whole do I battle or not. It's pretty obvious the EP service are going to be as obstructive as possible, so I'd rather have no report than one designed to go against our requested provision.

That said, I have emailed all parties, restating that I have not agreed to no Ed Psych assessment being done and that the recent meeting does not count as an assessment due to there being no attempt to meet, observe and assess DS1. I've done that so if we end up down the grievance route I can prove my attending the meeting was in no way accepting the refusal to assess.

I'm still trying to decide what to do over private EP assessment; we can just about run to one but if the LA agree our placement without battle it would be a giant waste of cash. The LA sen officer kept going on about plans being issued on February 13th but we had our transfer meeting on the 20th September. So by my calculations the 18 weeks is up on the 24th January. I get a little more confused every day!

You are very unlikely to get the placement you want without showing your teeth.

The first deadline you quote is the legal timeframe, but no LA's are consistently meeting that and there are no repercussions.

The 13th Feb is a date which a tribunal would penalise them for missing if there was a subsequent tribunal, as it is the date by which there is enough time to appeal a placement to secure provision for the following Sept.

Although it is extremely stressful, I would always say it is worth having the battle and getting the private reports done if you are able to, to help you frame your case. It is well known amongst parents in my LA that if you have form for taking them on, then they are more likely to be concessionary in the future, even though they try to make your life helI if you challenge them. I thought taking them to Tribunal to get proper provision would be the end of the matter, but every annual review since, their 'experts' have recommended cutting provision. Having said that, I do anticipate a huge battle when it comes to transfer to EHCP / secondary provision as I will be wanting to move to a specialist school.

I just don't really know at what point private EP report would have the greatest impact. SOS!SEN suggested getting one done beginning Jan so we had it ready for appeal. But I won't know whether we've got our placement of choice at the earliest 4th January or more likely February 13th.

Tbh we were planning on home ed as we knew the local secondary mainstream wouldn't be suitable, but the Specialist Teacher told us about the new enhanced ASC provision opening so we went and looked at her suggestion. It is also in another sub LA to us e.g. if we were north-County this is West-County.it is our geographical closest unit. So I'm not sure an appeal will get us anywhere.

Lots to think about.

If you can successfully make the argument as to why the LA's preferred provision will not meet your DS's needs and why your choice would, you are in with a fair chance. This is why private reports are useful as often the experts will write their reports skillfully so that they back up your case and reflect in them how your choice of school will best meet the needs of your DC and how the LA's choice would not be appropriate. Private reports are much more detailed than those commissioned by LA. For example, I had reports from the LA EP, OT and SALT and they varied between 1 and 3 pages long and were extremely general with wooly recommendations. The ones I had done privately were 15-30 pages long and were full of useful evidence to strengthen my claims.

You need experts who are experienced in tribunal work, and they tend to get very booked up. It's therefore probably worth booking the EP on a provisional basis at the very least. Even if you get the school you want the chances are that the rest of the EHCP will not be good, and you will need advice on what should be in there to support the case for your child staying at the school in question.

Just wanted to add, that my LA took a report to our second tribunal written by an LA EP who had never met my child! Luckily I had seen it the week before and had written my response to it which we submitted as late evidence immediately after the LA submitted the report.

The Judge and the expert panel members were very unimpressed by the report and took no notice of it at all!

I would get an independent assessment done if you can possibly afford it and go from there!

Good luck!

I should also have mentioned DS1 is very, very unlikely to engage in any attempt to assess him. So I'm not sure how much impact a report could have as it would be based on an hour's observation.

Ineed. I'm glad the report was ignored. At least our EP has just not written one at all!

I really want the impossible which is to know now what the placement outcome is. Which obviously I have to get over! If we were definitely going to go down the tribunal route I wouldn't be so hesitant.

You're all being very patient with me, I'm really annoying myself with my indecision.

Its so hard to know what is the right thing to do though!

If you want that placement, you are definitely going down the tribunal route. At least you need to act as if you are if you want to increase your chances of not doing.

Having done this thing a few times myself (8 placements in different LAs) and advised a gazillion others I can tell you that the answer to whether you will be given the placement is a big fat zero. Apart from the culture within LAs to refuse you are currently competing for a place with the parents who HAVE commissioned private EP reports.

8 placements . I used to post a lot more around 2009/10, I think I remember some of your early battles.

Would the school have to give access to an independent EP? There's a couple of things that are making me think they are closing ranks. Firstly a weird phonecall from the SENCo making sure I hadn't had a letter to a meeting as it was cancelled, and also saying she'd been instructed to cancel all meetings. This was on a Friday, meeting that allegedly had been cancelled was the Monday. I really think someone panicked that I'd been accidently invited, as I was not expecting another school meeting til Jan.
Then an email I sent has not been responded to when they have always answered within 24hrs, including on days they don't work.

Also, the email I sent stating I did not accept the LA not doing an EP assessment has not been responded to. It technically doesn't need a reply, but I sent it the the senior LA case officer and cc'd 4 other people in and not one has said "ok, noted"

So if I go ahead with an EP, when do you think would be best to do it (assuming school are obliging), as I've missed the boat to submit it as part of our original request.