Government Sets Out Plans To Overhaul Special Educational Needs System
The English government is proposing changes to mainstream schools to make them more inclusive of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) and to address the current postcode lottery. The proposed changes, which will be outlined in a green paper, include measures to increase accountability and provide earlier intervention to ensure children’s needs are better met in local settings. The paper will also introduce national standards across education, health, and care to assist children with SEND and make it compulsory for councils to publish inclusion plans to clarify responsibility among different sectors. Other proposals include the introduction of an "inclusion dashboard" to help parents understand what is available in their area and to establish a digitised education, health, and care plan for children with the greatest needs to reduce bureaucracy. Additionally, new national frameworks for banding and tariffs will be developed to provide appropriate support for children with different degrees of need. The education secretary hopes that these proposals will help to end the postcode lottery of uncertainty, increase confidence in the system, and enable parents to make better choices. Teaching unions acknowledge that schools have been inclusive, but they demand additional investment to enable children to access the necessary support. Ambitious about Autism and the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers have raised concerns about the framework and new proposals.
