Families feel “worn down and unheard”, say inspectors from the Care Quality Commission and Ofsted, who carried out the inspection of Redbridge Local Area Partnership in May 2025.
They found recurring breaches of the London borough’s statutory SEND duties, an “unsustainable” mismatch between levels of need and services, and no plan for capacity building.
The criticism echoes official national data on education, health and care plans (EHCPs) published last month, which found falling rates of plans being issued on time amid record levels of demand.
However, Redbridge is among the worst performing areas – in 2024, just 7% of EHCPs were issued within the statutory 20 week timeframe, compared with 76% in 2023. Some 6.5% of plans were issued after 52 weeks.
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