Learning Disability Today
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Government has no financial solution to end SEND crisis, new report finds

A damning new report from the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has highlighted a special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) system in disarray, which is failing the families who need it and putting almost half of all councils in England in danger of effective bankruptcy within 15 months.

The committee has issued an urgent call for the Government to improve the system to prevent a lost generation of vulnerable children from failing to reach their potential due to massive variations across the country in families’ wait times for education, health, and care plans (EHCPs).

It now wants the Government to ensure that schools receive adequate resources to provide SEND support without diverting resources needed for the education of other children.

The Department of Education should also investigate and better understand the reasons for the increasing and changing demand for SEND support and then set out how it will provide support more efficiently. It also needs to look at reasons for differences in identifying and supporting SEND needs across local areas and schools.

Lack of government urgency on funding issues

The Public Accounts Committee examines the value for money of Government projects, programmes and service delivery. Drawing on the work of the National Audit Office the Committee holds government officials to account for the economy, efficiency and effectiveness of public spending.

It says funding is key to achieving the ambitions in its report, yet many local authorities’ educational budgets are already in a ‘parlous state’ with a cumulative £4.6 billion deficit that has been deferred under the statutory override.

With local authorities facing the prospect of these deficits hitting their books in March 2026, the Government must set out what will happen next by the end of March 2025 so that they can prepare without disrupting SEND provision.

Findings from the PAC committee report

In 2023, only half of EHCPs were issued within the statutory 20-week period. Whether children receive support also depends too much on their postcode or how well their parents can navigate an often chaotic and adversarial system.

Equally, parents are appealing more SEND decisions, with an increase in the number appealed from 6,000 in 2018 to 15,600 in 2023. Of these, 98% of decisions were found in favour of parents, contributing to low confidence and which the Department recognises as indicative of poor value for money.

 

EHCP webinar

During the PAC’s inquiry, the Government attributed lengthening EHCP waiting times to increasing demand. However, it found that the Department for Education does not fully understand why the demand for support has increased.

The committee also found that the Department of Education was unclear about what it means by inclusive education, a core strand of its approach, and how it will be achieved.

In addition, no potential solutions to the critical and immediate financial challenges facing many local authorities due to persistent and significant SEND-related overspends were proposed.

With increasing demand for EHCPs, most local authorities have overspent their annual high-needs budget each year since 2016-17. This has contributed to growing cumulative deficits for many local authorities within their dedicated schools’ grant budgets, with others using reserves to cover SEND costs.

It adds that there is a real risk of unfairness in the treatment of local authorities, given that some have accrued SEN-related deficits and others have avoided doing so. Left unresolved, the issue risks undermining local government finance as a whole.

Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown MP, Chair of the Committee, said: “Urgent warnings have long been issued to Government on the failing SEND system from every quarter. This is an emergency that has been allowed to run and run. Families in need of help have been forced to spend precious energy fighting for the support they are legally entitled to, and local authorities to bear an unsustainable financial burden.

“The fact that 98% of cases taken to tribunal find in favour of families is staggering, and can only demonstrate that we are forcing people to jump through bureaucratic hoops for no good reason. It is long past time the Government took action matching the gravity of this situation. And yet our inquiry found no sense of urgency amongst officials to do so.

“The immensity of this situation cannot be overstated. As a nation, we are failing countless children. We have been doing so for years. At the same time, we are creating an existential financial risk for some local authorities, caused by that same failing system. This report must serve as a line in the sand for Government. Every day that goes by for families not receiving the right support is another day closer to a lost generation of young people.”

Government says it will take time to fix deep-rooted problems

Schools minister Catherine McKinnell said: “The system we’ve inherited has been failing families with SEND children for far too long – this is unacceptable and that’s why we set out our Plan for Change to ensure no child is left behind.

“These problems are deep-rooted and will take time to fix but we remain steadfast in our commitment to deliver the change that exhausted families are crying out for by ensuring better earlier intervention and inclusion.

“We are already making progress by investing £1 billion into SEND, £740 million for councils to create more specialist places in mainstream schools and through our Curriculum and Assessment Review which will look at barriers that hold children back from the best life chances.”

The National Autistic Society, however, said it was extremely concerning that despite years of warning, the Department for Education has failed to understand and act on the SEND crisis.

Joey Nettleton Burrows, Policy and Public Affairs Manager at the National Autistic Society, said: “This damning report makes clear the dire situation for the SEND system. Children and families are being failed and councils face massive financial risk. Many children can’t get the help and adjustments they need and miss out on years of education. Families are forced to spend time and energy fighting long battles to get support for their children, often to the point of tribunals, 99% of which find in favour of the family.

“Enough is enough. This Government must take immediate action, commit to all the recommendations in the report and set out a plan to end the SEND crisis.”

author avatar
Alison Bloomer
Alison Bloomer is Editor of Learning Disability Today. She has over 25 years of experience writing for medical journals and trade publications. Subjects include healthcare, pharmaceuticals, disability, insurance, stock market and emerging technologies. She is also a mother to a gorgeous 13-year-old boy who has a learning disability.

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