What is an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan?

An Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan is a legal document which describes a child’s special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). 

It also includes the help and support (this called provision) needed to meet your child’s SEND and the outcomes which will be achieved because of the help and support being put in place.

An EHC plan can only be issued after your child has gone through the needs assessment. 

If your child is issued an EHC plan

If your child is issued with an EHC plan, we are legally responsible for maintaining and updating the plan.

At the point that the plan is issued, we will confirm the name of the caseworker who has been assigned to your child. This caseworker will be your single point of contact throughout the lifetime of your child’s EHC plan and you should contact them with any questions you might have or to let us know about any concerns you have about your child SEND or the provision made for them.

Contact the SEND management team:

Email SEND@warrington.gov.uk or call 01925 442175

What should an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan contain?

EHC plan templates

An EHC plan does not have a fixed format and each local authority can develop its own version as long as it contains the following information:

• Section A - the views, interests and aspirations of the child and their parents.
• Section B - the child’s special educational needs.
• Section C - the child’s health care needs which relate to their SEN.
• Section D - the child’s social care needs which relate to their SEN or to a disability.
• Section E - the outcomes sought for the child.
• Section F - the special educational provision required to meet their SEN.
• Section G - any health care provision reasonably required by the learning difficulties or disabilities which result in the child having SEN.
• Section H - any social care provision required from children’s or adults services under the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970, and/or reasonably required by the learning difficulties or disabilities which result in the child having SEN.
• Section I - the name of the school or other institution to be attended by the child, and the type of that institution (or just the type if no specific institution is named).
• Section J - details of any direct payment which will be made.
• Section K - copies of all of the advice and information obtained as part of the EHC needs assessment.

Your child’s EHC plan will be written in a way that makes it clear who is required to do what, when it must happen and how often it should be reviewed.

Ipsea.org.uk has a checklist and further guidance: 

• What sections should an EHC plan have?
• EHC plan checklist

If you are unhappy about the contents of the EHC plan

If you are unhappy about the contents your child’s new or existing EHC plan, you can ask your child’s caseworker to change it if you believe it does not comply with the law.

You can do this if you have recently received a draft EHC plan, or at your child’s annual review.

If there has been a sudden or unexpected change in your child’s circumstances; or their special educational needs and/or disabilities have become significantly more severe, you can request an early annual review.

Annual reviews

Your child’s EHC plan must be reviewed at least once a year, or every six months if your child is under 5 years.

The EHC caseworker will work with the school and other professionals involved with your child to schedule a meeting date and time. We aim to give you as much notice as possible of this date/time – meeting dates will be agreed by the start of the new academic year and invites sent by the setting/school so that everyone supporting you and your child have as much notice as possible so that they can be involved.

If your child is not in school because they are being home educated or because they are NEET, the EHC caseworker will organise the meeting.

A request for any new information/assessments/reports will be sent to those involved with your child four weeks before the Annual Review Meeting. This new information will be shared with everyone requested to attend the meeting two weeks before the annual review.

At the annual review meeting, your child’s progress will be discussed – it is important that their views and experiences are central to the process and, they should be invited to attend and supported to contribute to the meeting.

If they do not feel confident attending the meeting, an independent advocate can be arranged to support you child at the meeting or speak on their behalf so that their views are discussed and considered in the meeting.

If they do not want to attend, they do not have to. But we would always ask them for their views so that this can be shared with the professionals attending the meeting.

The annual review meeting will be led by the EHC caseworker who will guide attendees to look at the progress your child has made towards achieving their outcomes and whether the provision specified in the EHC plan is still suitable.

Two weeks after the meeting, a report which contains a record of the discussions at the meeting and any suggested changes to the EHC plan will be sent to you.

Four weeks after the meeting, we will write to you and inform you of our decision to either:

• Maintain the EHC plan in its current format
• Amend the EHC plan
• Cease the EHC plan if we believe your child has achieved their outcomes.

If you are unhappy with our decision, the letter will contain further information about how to appeal.

Objecting to a decision made by the council

Early annual reviews

An early annual review can be called at any time if there are concerns about your child's needs and/or progress.

If an early annual review is needed we will aim to schedule the meeting no later than two weeks of the request being received.

The early annual review will follow the same process for other annual reviews outlined above.

Transitioning school

We will amend your child’s EHC plan when they transition from one phase of education to another. This means when they move between the different stages of education, from:

• An early years setting to a primary school
• Primary to secondary school
• Secondary school to a college.

If you child is transitioning from secondary school to a college, the EHC plan will be reviewed and amended by 31 March in the calendar year of the transfer. For all other transitions, the deadline is 15 February in the calendar year of the transfer.

If your child is already attending a post-16 college and it is proposed that they move from one college to another, we will review and amend the EHC plan at least five months before that transfer takes place (where enough notice is provided).

When we amend your child’s EHC plan, we will state in Section I the name of the setting your child will continue to attend until the end of the academic year, as well as the name the setting or the type of setting that they will attend from the start of the next academic year.

We will finalise the amended EHC plan within eight weeks of sending you a copy of the amended EHC plan.

Requesting a change of school place

Section 33 of the Children and Families Act 2014 says that a child or young person with an EHC plan must be educated in a mainstream setting or school unless:

• It is against the wishes of the child’s parent or the young person; or
• It is incompatible with the efficient education of others in that school and there are no reasonable steps that the Council can take to prevent this incompatibility.

You or your child is able to request a particular school or college to be named in their EHC plan. This can be when they get their first plan, it is being amended after a review, or they transition to another phase of education (such as when they move from primary to secondary school).

If you believe that your child’s school is no longer suitable, you must request an early annual review to look at why you have reached this decision.

You and your child are able to request any of the following types of setting, school or college:

• A maintained school or nursery (mainstream or special)
• An Academy (mainstream or special)
• An institution in the Further Education sector
• A non-maintained special school
• A section 41 school – a list of these schools is available from the Department for Education.

Once we receive the name of the school you wish for your child to attend we will consult with that school. We will ask the school to respond in 15 days of the request. However, this might not always be possible if the school is closed or if they need to meet with you and your child to assess their needs further.

At the time of the consultation, we may also consult with other providers they consider will be able to meet your child’s needs. It is important that you meet with these settings as well as your own preferred setting so that we can make a final decision. Non-attendance at these settings may will lead to delays in the decision-making process.

The final decision on the most suitable placement is based on the following three legal tests, set out in the SEND Code of Practice. We will decline a request for a change of placement if:

• The setting is unsuitable for your child’s age, ability, aptitude or special educational needs.
• The attendance of your child at that setting would be incompatible with the efficient education for others at the school and we are unable to prevent this incompatibility.
• The attendance of the child at the school would be incompatible with the efficient use of resources.

When looking at whether the placement is incompatible with the efficient use of resources, we assess the total cost of the placement (including the costs of providing home to school transport and any other services such as speech and language services) and whether your proposed school would constitute reasonable public expenditure in comparison to the proposed school.

The maximum recommended travel time from home to school is 45 minutes each way for children in a primary school and 75 minutes in a secondary school according to Child Advice Law – this will be taken into consideration as part of the Council’s decision about the most suitable school place.

When we write you to confirm your child’s new school place, we will provide further information about your right to appeal our decision.

Elective home education

You may want to educate your child at home - this is what is called elective home education.

The Department for Education’s ‘All you need to know about home-schooling and elective home education’ provides important information you should be aware of if you are considering home schooling as an option.

In considering this, you should be aware that we:

• Do not have a legal duty to secure any of the special educational provision in your child’s EHC plan if they are being home-educated.
• Will continue to maintain your child’s EHC plan and to convene an Annual Review to assure ourselves that the provision set out in it continues to be appropriate and that your child’s SEND continues to be met.

If you wish to home educate your child, you should write to:

• Your child’s school and explain that you intend to educate your child at home
• The SEND team at SEND@warrington.gov.uk and ask us to amend Section I of the EHC plan to record that the child is being educated at home.

If your child is at special school you will need agreement from the Council prior to their name being taken off from the school roll.

Alternative education

If your child is unable to attend school for any reason, you should write to us at SEND@warrington.gov.uk to let us know at the earliest opportunity.

We will then be able to put in place alternative education - this may be with a provider registered with Ofsted if your child is well enough to attend school, or where this is not possible we will put in place home tuition.

Education other than at school

Education other than at school (EOTAS) means the education of children outside of a formal nursery, school or college.

If you consider, for any reason, it would not be appropriate for your child to be educated at nursery, school or college, you will need to tell us about your concerns.

An early annual review will be convened to discuss whether it is appropriate for us to make alternative arrangements for your child to receive a suitable education for their age, ability, aptitude and their SEND other than at school.

Your child may need a reassessment to inform the EOTAS package of support. Any reassessments are subject to panel’s approval and if agreed they follow the same initial assessment process, starting at week 6.

An EOTAS package is full time, unless we decide as part of the reassessment that, for medical or mental health reasons, a reduced level of education would be in your child’s best interests. To make this decision, you will be required be provide evidence from a suitably qualified health professional who has assessed your child’s physical or mental health.

All children engaged in EOTAS will be provided with access to a broad and balanced curriculum, in line with the Department for Education’s National Curriculum. The package of support is bespoke and can be delivered using a mix of arrangements, such as online learning, home tuition or in an alternative registered setting. We will fund this provision by either procuring this provision directly or by providing you with a personal education budget.

Before taking these steps, we will need to be assured that there is no suitable setting or school that can meet your child’s needs.

If EOTAS is agreed for child, we will convene a multi-agency meeting to agree the package and we will amend your child’s EHC plan as follows:

• Section B – this will include evidence of why education in a nursery, school or college is inappropriate for your child.
• Section F – this will detail the package of support your child needs and who will oversee this and deliver it (including what particular expertise they may need, and any input needed from specialists). This will also detail that the provision will be delivered as ‘education otherwise than in a school’.
• Section I – this will be left blank as no setting is going to be attended.
• Section J – this will detail the special educational needs and outcomes to be met by any agreed direct payments relating to section F. Not everyone will have a personal education budget and receive direct payments.
• Ceasing an EHC plan

We may decide to cease your child’s EHC plan if we consider that we are no longer responsible or it is no longer necessary to maintain the plan.

We would no longer be responsible if:

• Your young person has taken up paid employment.
• Your young person has started university or higher education.
• Your young person is 18 or over, has left education and no longer wishes to engage in further learning.
• Your young person has turned 25 years.
• Your child has moved out of Warrington.

We would not consider it necessary to maintain your child’s EHC plan if they no longer need the special educational needs provision as their needs have changed or because they have achieved their outcomes set out in their EHC plan.

If your child is over 19 years you should refer to the criteria for continuing EHC plans after the end of compulsory schooling, in  Preparation for Adulthood.