02.15 Are there rules for determining which LA is responsible for a CYP’s special educational provision?
Noddy No-nonsense Guide
Authors: David Wolfe KC, Leon Glenister
04 Nov 2022
A: SenseCheck
- 1 Yes
- 0 No
- 0 Other
- 24 Feb 2025
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Yes
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Complex
Yes. The duties in relation to EHCPs are owed by the LA who is “responsible” for the CYP, and an LA “is responsible for a [CYP] if he or she is in the authority’s area”: CFA2014 s24(1). Only one authority ca be responsible: JG v Kent CC [2016] EWHC 1102 (Admin) #121.
In determining in whose area a CYP is in, the High Court considered “ordinary residence are…no more than indirect pointers” as to whether a CYP has moved: JG #134.The UT has, however, recently created uncertainty by putting it more strongly and seemingly writing words into the statue, by stating that “ordinary (or habitual) residence is the test for whether a child is in a local authority’s area”: Hampshire CC v GC [2024] UKUT 128 (AAC) #206.
To the extent ordinary residence is the test, the test in R v Brent LBC ex p Shah [1983] 2 AC 309 at 343 refers to the place a person “has adopted voluntarily and for settled purposes as part of the regular order of his life for the time being, whether or short or of long duration….And there must be a degree of settled purpose” (the Shah test was approved by the Supreme Court in R (Cornwall Council) v Secretary of State for Health [2015] UKSC 46).
24 Feb 2025
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