Bristol Labour Councillor Tells People to be “Patient” with EHCP Delays
The Bishopsworth councillor made the comment in a meeting at the council house this month
- Be “patient” with EHCP delays councillor says
- Education boss hopes EHCP backlog with have reduced to a level the council can cope with by January 2027
The law says that the length of time it must take local authorities to conduct an Education Health Care Needs Assessment, then finalise an Education Health Care Plan (EHCP) must be 20 weeks. But a Bristol councillor has said families need to be “patient”, despite some waiting over a year for a finalised plan.
The comment was made by Councillor Susan Kollar at Children and Young People Policy Committee this month.
Executive Director of Children and Education Hannah Woodhouse covered performance around EHCPs as part of an update to Children and Young People Policy Committee this month.
Hannah Woodhouse said: “We’re looking at a slight rise in terms of the number of needs assessments and we’re looking at 08 per cent timeliness overall. But what we are seeing in our work generally is more needs assessments being assessed through social care, through education, through the health system quicker. But obviously we know we’ve got a large number waiting.
“We are seeing those being moved forward. I don’t know if Vik might want to give us the February data which we’ll come to in a minute. But there is some more recent data than that which was available when we produced this paper which looking is looking more positive.
“We continue as a top priority to improve our work to support children with EHCPs as quickly as we possibly can. And while they are waiting for EHCPS, we are supporting them in school. And we’ll talk a bit about the the capital program to provide additional specialist places which is on the agenda. “
The performance data in the papers show that last year just 07 per cent of EHCPs were completed on time up to the end of November 2025.
Papers say that ‘improving’ the timeliness and quality of plans ‘remains a priority’.
The timeliness for December 2025 was just 08 per cent.
Bristol City Council says that they received a total of 1,471 EHCNA requests in 2025 – a decrease of 08 per cent compared to the same period in 2024.
‘The rate of requests per 10,000 population in Bristol for Quarter 2 2025/26 was 17, below the national
rate of 18.5.’
There were 154 requests for Education, Health and Care Needs Assessments (EHCNA) in December 2025.
Papers continue: ”Progress against the EHCNA Improvement Plan continues to be monitored by QuIP Board. There has been a 37 per cent increase in new EHCPs finalised in the 2025 calendar year compared with 2024. Educational Psychology output has similarly strengthened, with a 53 per cent rise in EP reports completed over the same period.’
Following the update, Labour Councillor for Bishopsworth ward, Susan Kollar who is a teacher of English, Maths and Functional Skills in Bristol asked: “I got a couple of things. Going back to page 28 and 29, looking at the percentages around EHCPs, just getting me head around it because I’ve had to do maths. Okay.
“So looking at the ones that are issued within 20 weeks, I note that the percentage is matching the national average but in terms of of points I note that we’ve gone down.
“However, the ones that have been finalized in the month for the first time has gone up. But there’s this plus 291 for the year to date. So, does that mean although some EHCP percentages have gone down, but some have gone up? Is that because we’re balancing those extra numbers of EHCPs that are coming through?
“So, of course, at that point, there’s going to be obviously a a dip in some things, but a rise in others. And is that because of the correlation of the amount of kids we’re getting in?”
Director of Education and Skills, Vik Verma said: “I’ll try and try and answer that. There’s a couple of things.
“For the whole of 2025 uh there was a 37 per cent increase in the number of Education Health and Care Plans finalised by the Send service in it in its entirety. So that’s more than we have produced in several years. So, so the service is doing good work in terms of increasing the productivity. But we’ve got to go further.
“Because of that significant rise that we saw in 2024 where we had I think about 35 per cent more EHCPs requests come in during that period when non-statutory top up was withdrawn. That has created that pressure in the service. So that persisted for about 18 months in total. Pretty much in into last year as well and what we have seen is that pressure did bring down timeliness.
“But what we are seeing is whilst timeliness is reducing the actual overall output of the service continues to climb. So we will probably experience challenges around timeliness for some for some time, probably for a lot of this calendar year while we work through that backlog.
“But our kind of key driver here is is two things. I think. One making sure that we are finalising more plans that are coming in and that’s where our improvement plan comes into place. But also that we continuously requests remain at a similar level to where they are at the moment. We’re tracking that and I think at the moment the figures which aren’t in this report because we report slightly lagged is that timeliness for January, for the calendar month was 13 per cent with 94 plans issued in total. And then for February which has just ended timeliness increased to 25 per cent with 110 plans issued. So the service is continuing to drive forward improvement in that area.
Susan Kollar followed: “That’s kind of what I thought my number showed, but I just wanted to check because I think it’s important to recognise that sometimes there may be that pressure on the service, but if we are getting a lot more young children coming through with EHCPs, there’s got to be that kind of patience that needs to go with that because obviously as a service there’s, you know, there’s that kind of limitation to how many children we get in and how many HCPs that we can get out in a timely manner. But overall everything else is like going up. So we’re balancing it all out.”
This is utterly shocking. Bristol Labour Councillor Susan Kollar is basically telling families that they need to be patient for their unlawfully delayed EHCPs. I’m stunned #send #ehcp #bristol #disability pic.twitter.com/V2A3FJXv0c
— Chopsy Bristol (@ChopsyBristol) March 5, 2026
Susan Kollar asks for “patience” regarding EHCP delays
Vik Verma replied: “And I think just to add, we know we have a huge amount more to do here and we’re going to have to sustain this performance for the whole of this calendar year to get beyond the backlog. And my hope is that you know in January 2027, you know we’re in a space where the backlog has subsided to a level that the service can manage then in a normal space but it’s going to be a significant activity.
“We are also working with the Bristol Parent Carer Forum. There are two things I think. One we’ve been communicating with families and the recent survey we did with families showed that they you know for those that responded in the main they do understand the pressure on the service and they empathise with that but they of course you know keen to see it progress.
“But communication is improved but also on our Local Offer what we do uh in readiness for each of these committees is a short parent friendly update of things we are discussing in this meeting.
So again families get an understanding for full transparency as to what we are doing to improve performance.
Chair of the committee, Green Councillor for Southville, Christine Townsend said: “This is going to come back and back again. The timeliness. The impact of how schools, families and the system respond to what they might anticipate might come out with the SEN reforms is something that is beyond sort of what we can predict really as a council. It’s going to be interesting to see.
“when the top up was removed, it took a couple of months to see the impact of that. Because that’s how long usually it takes for schools and SendCos to get and families to get to the point where they can put an application in. So, we wouldn’t expect necessarily to see the impact two weeks later or less than two weeks later.
“However, the other side of Easter, we might start to see the applications coming in, go up again. But that is just how it is unfortunately and that is something that is beyond our control.
“But we will respond to that and keep an eye on it and as a committee we’ll keep on top of it and at quality and improvement, you know we’ll also be looking at it and I know Vic Verma looks at this you know, I’d imagine that he spends quite a large part of his time thinking and looking and monitoring what’s going on in this particular element of of the service.”
Following the meeting, Bristol Send Justice said: “A quick reminder about the reality of EHCPs in Bristol.
“Bristol is well below the national average for EHCP assessment requests. In simple terms, Bristol City Council receives fewer requests than most local authorities across England.
“Yet Bristol is finalising just 8% of EHCPs within the 20-week legal timeframe.
“The national average is 46%, according to Department for Education data.
“So despite fewer requests, Bristol is still one of the worst performers on timeliness.
“1,300+ children and young people are currently stuck in the backlog.
“300+ are waiting for a special school place.
“40 more children became electively home educated in just one month.
“And curiously, the Children and Young People’s Committee has stopped reporting the average number of weeks it takes to finalise an EHCP.
“These aren’t just statistics.They are children waiting for support they are legally entitled to.
“The numbers speak for themselves.”
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