What did you pay for pre action protocol letter? Had enough!

[Chattypetey1]

Just trying to gauge roughly how much I can expect to pay for initial letter?

LA issued son's EHCP in August 2023 and haven't reviewed it since, As these things always are, its a complicated rollercoaster of a story with lots of twists and turns, but the upshot is we. have a very out of date EHCP and a disabled child who desperately needs help to access education, the LA are ignoring, gaslighting, using all their usual tricks and we've had enough.

I've already reported them to Health and Social Care Ombusmen for their process failures and have also reported to ICO for ignoring my Subject Accesss Request, and the next step (because they told me via stage 2 complaint that they don't intend to change anything in section F- which is ridiculous) is tribunal but cant begin this process until they provide draft EHCP.

I feel like their stalling is deliberate and need to get solicitor involved. Any advice gratefully recieved.

This is how long is a piece of string. From a few hundred to well over one thousand. The cheapest are from people like SOSSEN or some advocates. However, some LAs are sometimes not taking pre-action letters from people who aren’t part of a legal aid firm seriously because they know if they ignore you still have to find someone with capacity to take on the case, which can take perseverance at the moment, and they will sometimes want to send another pre-action letter via them. LAs are sometimes take the change at kicking the can down the road.

You do not get the right of appeal with a draft. You can’t appeal until you have the right of appeal which will come with a final EHCP or the notification the LA will maintain as is.

Do you mean the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsmen (LGSCO or LGO)? I don’t think you mean the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO).

Be aware that because JR is supposed to be a remedy of last resort sometimes going down the complaint process/LGO route can mean JR isn’t an option because it acknowledges another remedy. Not it all cases, but sometimes.

Have you tried emailing the Director of Children’s Services and the Monitoring Officer?

Thanks for your response @inthequietofdawn , really helpful. Yes I did mean the LGSCO, and I have copied the head of children’s services in all the way through the complaints process, but have not heard of monitoring officer, will check them out.

i thought I could appeal as soon as I received the draft as I know I won’t like what it says, but they haven’t even sent that yet, they are completely stonewalling me. It’s technically now nearly 2 years overdue, hence the lgsco referral.

interesting about solicitors, I will research ones that can take on a case- thank you again.

No, you can’t appeal when you get the draft/amendment notice/notice of amendment. At that point you can propose amendments that are required referencing your evidence and state your preferred placement, but you don’t get the right of appeal until you have the finalised EHCP (or if the LA isn’t going to amend, when the LA inform you of their decision to maintain as is or when they inform you of their plan to cease to maintain). See here.

You could start with Lawstop, Access to Public Law, Simpson Millar, Sinclairs, Leigh Day and Watkins. It can take time to find someone with capacity.

That is a brilliantly useful document, thank you so much for sharing and for your guidance.

I just paid £480 for a PAP relating to unlawful procedures - very long story short but following annual review they issued a new final EHCP, then a week later sent out another stating "minor amendments to name school" which had reverted entirely back to the original, 2 days before the end of school and then went silent on me - I spoke to numerous lawyers and most said that they are allowed to do that but the fact is they can't without following the correct process - I found a lawyer called Emma Tennant - she is a SEN mum who got into SEN law due to failings to her son - she was waaaay more helpful than anyone else I spoke to - the JR process is way more complex than I thought, it's like they make it easy for LA's to constantly screw us all over - they can't ignore the lawyers though so to me it is worth the cost - deadline for response is tomorrow so we will see...