Children with special educational needs are being failed by the system – here’s how we fix the crisis

There is obviously a lot that is wrong in the system for how we provide education for children with special educational needs – and it needs to be urgently fixed.

Good teachers are doing their best for every child, but are being driven to breaking point by the hoops they have to jump through to prove the children they work with need extra support.

Hundreds of millions of pounds in extra cash has flowed into the system under the last government, but outcomes for children are somehow getting ever worse.

Despite this increased funding, too many families still face long delays. Some councils are under such strain that only a tiny fraction of Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCP) – which specify the help children need – are completed within the required 20 weeks.

In the 2021/22 academic year, fewer than 60 per cent of those with special educational needs at Key Stage 4 were in sustained education, an apprenticeship or employment after the age of 16, compared to 85 per cent for those without special needs.

But we also know that there are great things happening too.

Thousands of parents and children are having positive experiences in schools, nurseries and colleges, thanks to the leadership and dedication of many great teachers and other staff.

For me, the most important reform that the government can get right is improving the way we provide education for children and young people with special educational needs and disability (SEND).

That’s why I am delighted to be providing advice to ministers and helping them hear the views of as many children, parents and professionals as possible as they think through their options. The government will set out its plans for reform in the coming months.

The question for policymakers is: if we are getting it right for some, how do we get it right for all?

There are schools and trusts across the country that are really making inclusion a priority, building high-quality support in schools and prioritising their staff development in this area. Green shoots, in other words.

Yet, for too many in the system that currently exists, support for children with SEND is hard-won and closely protected.

Parents have precious little faith left that change can ever be positive. The current system is highly adversarial, and families have often fought hard to get the support their child deserves.

The EHCP – the document that unlocks the system and promises to deliver what children need, but still often doesn’t – has become emblematic of that.

For those who have never had to encounter them, they are a long, bureaucratic process which ties up enormous parental and professional time – more of which should be going on supporting children.

But it shouldn’t be that way. Millions of children up and down the country have various types of SEND, and hundreds of thousands have more specialist needs requiring an EHCP.

SEND support must be normal and routine – not something special or exceptional.

Every time I sit down with officials and ministers, their message is clear: they want to protect the support every child and family currently has in place, while they make changes so that it becomes normal and routine for support to be provided early, at a high quality, and without a fight.

And so, the conversations I’m having are not about whether we do or don’t scrap EHCPs – they’re about fixing these systemic issues that make SEND support so hard to access.

Change means finding a way of ensuring educational psychologists and speech and language professionals can be in classrooms, working with children in partnership with parents.

I spoke at an event recently that also looked at the role of special needs coordinators in schools, who now find so much of their time is tied to an office desk instead of working alongside teaching staff to develop their skills in working with children with additional needs.

Change means fixing that.

The question I always come back to is: can we finally find a way of stopping parents having to battle for support?

How can we create a system that gives every parent confidence that their child will receive the support they need, at the right time, with the right level of professional intervention?

I have every reassurance that for the hundreds of thousands of children with EHCPs, there will continue to be high-quality support.

More than that, I know change, this time round, can be a positive thing. Crucially, that will only come through continuing an open dialogue with everyone in the system – especially children and parents – as we move forward.

I hope this is the starting point in a much longer discussion about how we can build a better system in which all children – and especially those with the most complex needs – can thrive.