Facts: North Somerset cut the claimants’ funding by 33 per cent and replaced their direct payments with a managed care service. The claimants sought a judicial review.

Judgment: Laws J dismissed the application on the basis that, factually, whilst North Somerset had reduced the budget it was providing the same level of service and that very serious concerns had arisen about the conduct of the claimants’ parents in relation to the direct payments. North Somerset had not been under a duty of consultation and any breach of the public sector equality duty (PSED) had been purely theoretical.