Hertfordshire County Council has refused to disclose how much it spent fighting a High Court case against the parent of a child with SEND last year.
In the case, a judge found that the council is acting unlawfully every time it fails to complete a child's EHCP within 20 weeks.
But, in response to a Freedom of Information request asking how much the council had spent fighting the case, it refused to disclose details.
The council said that it would be withholding information about the costs of the barrister used because it considers it to be "personal information". It said that disclosing it would "not be appropriate, fair or lawful".
The Freedom of Information request did not ask for any details beyond the monetary cost to the council.
In response to a similar request last year, Stevenage Borough Council provided information to this newspaper about the legal costs involved in fighting a High Court case.
While the county council did not disclose any costs, they did explain that lawyers and paralegals from their own legal services department had spent a total of 225.3 hours on the case.
The council said that this "does not reflect a cost", and that calculating the time spent against the yearly earnings of staff members involved would "not reflect a true figure of the cost of the matter". They confirmed that they "do not hold the information" requested about internal costs.
The Freedom of Information request was submitted by a concerned Hertfordshire resident, who told this newspaper that they estimated the total cost to the council of fighting the case may have been "in excess of £80,000".
They told us that this had been spent "defending in indefensible on a case it was never going to win".
"Just imagine how that money could have benefitted local services.
"It would have been cheaper to have spent the money actually carrying out their statutory duty, rather than fighting local taxpayers.
"It would have been cheaper to send the child and their family for assessment to America with a week's trip to Disneyland thrown in - that would have saved £70,000 at least!"
"How can HCC budget when it couldn't even tell us how much things cost when asked?
"It might explain why we have just seen an increase by HCC of nearly 5 per cent in our council tax bills."
Responding to this story, a council spokesperson said: “We are always mindful of the cost of defending legal action brought against us, but we will defend cases when we believe we have grounds to do so.
"In this case, mindful of the costs for both parties, we have been able to reach a negotiated settlement, minimising the expense for everyone involved.
“As our FOI response made clear, data protection law prevents us from providing details of fees paid to external legal professionals instructed by the council.
"We feel that we have provided as much information as we legally can in response to this request. The requester has been advised of their right to ask the Information Commissioner’s Office to review the council’s position. We are happy to cooperate with any review."
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