Derbyshire County Council pay over £165k in compensation in just six months - amid 347 SEND department complaints
Derbyshire County Council have issued apology and promised improvements – after authority was faced to pay over £165k in compensation in less than six months.
A Freedom of information request (FOI) has revealed that the SEND department at the Derbyshire County Council received 347 complaints between June 1, 2024 and November 21, 2024.
September, when a number of children with special educational needs were left without a school transport due to the council’s failures, saw the highest number of complaints – 85 out of 347.
The local authority paid out a total of £168 740.03 in compensation between June and November this year, with staggering £50,833 paid out to families of children with special educational needs in July.
This comes as the council’s SEND department was heavily criticised in an Ofsted report published in November, following an inspection which had been carried out two months earlier, between September 23 and September 27, 2024.
The report states that ‘ widespread and systemic failings’ have led to ‘significant concerns’ and must be ‘addressed urgently’.
But after Ofsted published its findings, many Derbyshire parents who had been failed by the SEND department, said they did not believe much would change for the most vulnerable pupils across the county.
Commenting on the figures revealed by the FOI and the Ofsted report, a Derbyshire County Council spokesperson said: “We fully accept the findings of the recent Derbyshire Local Area Partnership SEND Ofsted report which found our services were not of the quality children and their families should expect and for that we apologise.
“We did experience some issues with school transport last term for a small number of children where in some cases applications had not been renewed. We contacted and apologised to those parents at the time and brought in additional staff to manage a high number of calls and emails and to deal with reimbursement claims.
“Around the issue of compensation, some payments will relate to older complaints from parents so there’s no direct correlation between the number of complaints made per month and payments per month, but we see working closely with and communicating well with parents is crucial for success and this is an area where we’ve already taken significant steps to improve.
“We’ve recently invested £1m to fund a complete SEND service redesign including a new team set-up, additional staff, specialist training and new software to improve how we manage each child’s case and communicate with their parents. We hope this will soon start to reduce complaints and create positive improvements in this area.
“Meanwhile, we announced £11 million in July to increase the number of school places for children with special needs by around 300 over the next two years, having already worked with special schools to create 200 more places since 2020.
“We know there’s still a lot to do but we continue to work hard with our health, education, private, public and voluntary sector partners to offer a service children with special educational needs deserve and we remain committed to this ambition for them.”