LAs assess social care needs by seeking social care advice during the EHC needs assessment, then recording provision in Section H: H1 for services owed as a duty under the CSDPA 1970, H2 for all other social care.
The trigger is the EHC needs assessment itself. Once you decide to assess, you must seek social care advice and information as part of it. That advice is not a box-tick. It should be a holistic look at the child or young person’s social care needs, drawn from or combined with any assessment under section 17 of the Children Act 1989, early help, or a child-in-need assessment where one is appropriate. A reply of “not known to this service” is not adequate social care advice, and an assessment that rests on it is open to challenge.
From advice to the plan
Identified social care needs are set out in Section D of the plan. The provision that meets them goes in Section H, which splits in two. Keeping the two halves apart matters, because they carry different legal weight.
| Section H1 | Section H2 |
|---|---|
| Services under section 2 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970 (CSDPA), for under-18s | All other social care: section 17 Children Act 1989 services, and adult Care Act 2014 provision for those over 18 |
| A duty — must be specified | Largely discretionary |
| Enforceable, and not subject to a means test | Not directly enforceable through the EHC plan |
Section H1 records provision the authority must arrange under section 2 of the CSDPA 1970 — for example practical help in the home, recreational and educational facilities outside it, travel assistance, home adaptations, or holidays — once you are satisfied, through assessment, that doing so is necessary to meet a disabled child’s needs. Because it is a duty, H1 must be specified, and it is enforceable for under-18s. Section H2 records everything else: section 17 services, and from 18 the adult social care a young person is assessed for under the Care Act 2014.
The decisions officers get wrong
- Under-recording an H1 duty. Putting a CSDPA section 2 service in H2, or leaving it vague, turns a duty you must meet into something that reads as discretionary. That creates an enforceability gap and a clear line of complaint or appeal.
- Treating “not known to this service” as advice. It is not. Go back for a holistic social care view, combined with a section 17 assessment where appropriate.
- Waiting for a diagnosis. Social care need turns on disability and assessed need, not on a completed diagnosis. A child can be a disabled child and a “child in need” under section 17 before any diagnosis is finalised, and that is enough to engage the duty.
- Skipping statutory sign-off. The social care content should be signed off by the authority’s statutory social care function, not settled by the SEN team alone.
Where the assessment surfaces an immediate safety concern for the child, follow your local safeguarding procedures straight away rather than holding it within the EHC timeline. In immediate danger, that means 999. The EHC process runs alongside child protection duties; it does not replace them.
Where the law comes from
Related
This page is general information, not clinical or legal advice.