What councils' own SEND data tells parents

We are sending Freedom of Information requests to local authorities across England, asking them to release the SEND numbers they do not normally publish — phase-transfer compliance, refusal-to-assess concession rates, EP advice timeliness, complaint outcomes, LGSCO decisions, and Tribunal volumes. Every response we receive is published below in the same format, so parents can see how their own council compares.

This is a living article. Each council added gets its own section using the same Q1–Q8 framework. Use Ctrl-F (Cmd-F on Mac) to jump to your council, or scroll the headings.

Telford & Wrekin Council — April 2026

Telford & Wrekin Council were the first to respond inside the statutory 20 working day deadline. Their data is below.

Source: Telford & Wrekin Council FOI response TWC-85420, dated 28 April 2026, signed by Daniel Hyde, Information Governance Team.

The headline: when parents push back, parents win

Of every refusal-to-assess decision Telford & Wrekin parents took to the First-tier SEND Tribunal:

For three years running, the council has reversed the majority of refusal-to-assess decisions parents formally challenged. In 2023 and 2024, almost every single one. If your child was refused an assessment in Telford & Wrekin and you accepted that "no", the council's own data suggests you very likely had grounds to win.

Mediation challenges have more than doubled in two years — from 31 in 2023 to 72 in 2025. Parents are pushing back harder, and the council is conceding case after case.

Half of statutory EP reports were late

Regulation 8(1) of the SEND Regulations 2014 sets a six-week deadline for statutory Educational Psychology advice during an EHC needs assessment. Paragraph 9.52 of the SEND Code of Practice confirms it as the universal expectation.

In 2024, two-thirds of statutory EP reports missed the legal deadline. By 2025 it improved — but half are still late, and the longest single delay was 9 weeks (50% over the legal limit). Demand is up 28% in a single year (328 → 421 requests), and capacity is not keeping pace.

Zero parent-funded EP reports accepted

Many parents pay privately for an Educational Psychology report — sometimes hundreds or thousands of pounds — to speed up the assessment process or because the council's own EP cannot see their child for months. The council was asked how many of those private reports it accepted to meet its statutory duty under Regulation 6(1)(d).

The answer: zero in 2024. Zero in 2025.

Every single statutory assessment used either the in-house EPS or an external EP commissioned by the council. Parents who paid for private reports waited for the council's EP regardless. There is no recognised path in Telford & Wrekin for a parent-funded report to count towards the statutory assessment.

Heavy reliance on external EPs

More than half of all statutory EP advice in both years came from external/locum EPs commissioned by the council, not from the in-house service:

The council confirmed external EP arrangements (frameworks, panels, spot-purchase) were in place throughout. Allocation between internal and external is "informed by a range of operational factors, including current workflow and the available capacity of the internal EPS" — i.e. routed reactively rather than triggered automatically by waiting times.

Complaints — Stage 1 dismisses, Stage 2 upholds

A quick reminder of how the council complaints procedure works:

• Stage 1 — your complaint is reviewed by the council team responsible for the service you are complaining about. They write back with a decision: upheld, partly upheld, or not upheld.
• Stage 2 — if you are not satisfied with the Stage 1 outcome, you can escalate. A more senior officer (usually outside the original team) reviews the complaint again.
• LGSCO — once both stages are exhausted, you can take the complaint to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, an independent body outside the council.

Telford & Wrekin's own data shows Stage 1 routinely dismisses complaints that later get upheld at Stage 2 or by the LGSCO:

When a parent escalates to Stage 2, they are more likely than not to win. That suggests Stage 1 is under-acknowledging legitimate complaints. If you are considering closing your file because your Stage 1 complaint was dismissed, the council's own numbers say: don't.

LGSCO decisions and remedies are climbing

Small absolute numbers, but a clear upward trajectory. Four LGSCO findings against the council in 2025 is four times the prior two years combined.

Tribunal pressure is rising

Tribunal appeals against Telford & Wrekin are up 81% in three years. But the council is now defending more cases at hearing rather than settling — concessions before hearing have fallen from 53% to 20%. Parents are still winning at refusal-to-assess stage, but the council is fighting harder on substantive Section B/F appeals.

The one number that looked too clean: 100%

Telford & Wrekin reported 100% compliance with both phase-transfer deadlines (31 March for post-16, 15 February for all others) in both 2024 and 2025. The council noted it does not collect raw counts — only percentages.

Without the underlying numerator and denominator, "100%" is impossible to audit. We have noted it in the published response without comment, but we will be asking for the underlying figures in our next FOI cycle.

What this means for parents in Telford & Wrekin

The council's own data tells you:

• If your assessment was refused — challenge it. 69-100% of Tribunal appeals were reversed by the council in the last three years.
• If your EP report is taking forever — you are not alone. Half of statutory reports miss the 6-week deadline, with delays of up to 10 weeks.
• If you paid for a private EP report — be aware the council does not currently accept parent-funded reports towards the statutory assessment. You may still need to wait for the council's EP.
• If your Stage 1 complaint was dismissed — escalate. Stage 2 upheld 80% of dismissed Stage 1 complaints in 2024.
• If you reach Tribunal on Section B or F — be prepared for the council to defend at hearing. Concession rates on substantive appeals have fallen sharply.

More councils coming

As other local authorities respond to our FOI requests, we will publish each one here in the same format — same questions, same tables, same year-on-year comparisons — so parents can see how their own council compares.

If your council has not yet responded to a similar FOI request and you would like us to send one, get in touch. The data belongs to parents. The law says councils must release it. We are publishing it.