PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
SEND Provision - 9 September 2024 (Commons/Commons Chamber)

The Conservatives left a trail of devastation across education, and nowhere is that clearer than in our current special educational needs and disabilities system. We know that, for too many children and families, the system is just not working, but I give my personal commitment to hon. Members across the House that the Government will listen to and work with families to deliver reform, improving inclusivity in mainstream schools and ensuring that special schools are able to help those with the most complex needs.

Last week, I visited Expert Citizens in Stoke-on-Trent, where people with lived experience of using public services help to inform system redesign. Many of my constituents across different councils have reported issues with SEND transport, which highlights the importance of listening to people with lived experience. In one example, a single working mother may need to give up her job because she does not have a car. She does not get SEND transport because she is 0.1 miles outside and therefore she cannot get her child to school. Does the Secretary of State agree that SEND transport needs a service rethink—one centred and built on the lived experience of the parents and children who use that service?

My hon. Friend is right to stress the need to listen to children, families and all those working in the system in order to deliver reform. If she can share some more detail with me, I will happily take a look.

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for her answer and to the Minister for School Standards for her response to last week’s Westminster Hall debate, led by my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Alistair Strathern), on SEND provision in Hertfordshire. As the Minister will recall, there are many heartbreaking experiences faced by children and young people in Stevenage and across Hertfordshire, where waiting times are much higher than the national average. Will the Secretary of State therefore consider a fairer funding settlement for SEND provision in Hertfordshire when she is next able to do so?

My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the significant interest in the Westminster Hall debate, and the level of interest today demonstrates the importance of getting this issue right. I know from speaking to him that he is concerned about the issue. I agree that it is important that there is a fair education funding system that directs funding where it is most needed. One aspect of that is the national funding formula and allocating high-needs funding. We will take our time to look carefully at whether any changes are required, including in Hertfordshire.

May I ask my right hon. Friend to detail the Department’s plans to help to solve the recruitment problem for SEND professionals, to enable schools to deal with education, health and care plans in constituencies such as mine, North Somerset?

It is certainly the case that there is a big workforce challenge, and making sure that we have specialists in critical areas is a central part of making sure children and young people can access the support they need. Our school support staff will play a crucial role in that, which is why Labour will reinstate the school support staff negotiating body. We will make sure that teachers have more training alongside support staff, in order to deliver better support and education for our young people, and this year we are investing over £21 million to train 400 more educational psychologists.[Official Report, 7 October 2024; Vol. 754, c. 2WC.] (Correction)

I welcome the Secretary of State’s answer. On doorsteps, in surgeries and over email, families across Basingstoke have told me countless stories of the obstacles they have to go through just to have the barest acknowledgement of their child’s needs, only to go through a similar obstacle course for their child to be assessed, and yet again for them to get the help they are legally entitled to. Can the Secretary of State offer families in Basingstoke with experience of this failing system some hope that they can expect better in future?

I joined my hon. Friend in Basingstoke during the general election campaign, so I know that many families in Basingstoke and right across our country were concerned about this issue, and I can give him that commitment. Members on the Conservative Benches may recall that the previous Education Secretary described the system that she left behind as one that was “lose-lose-lose”. I agree. We are determined to turn that around, which is why we have already restructured the Department for Education, with much more focus on support for children with SEND as part of our schools provision.

Speech and language support for children with special educational needs and disabilities was clearly not a priority for the previous Government. I have seen the damage that that has done to families in my constituency of Ealing Southall: at a recent surgery, one mum told me that she just wants her young son to be able to tell her when he is in pain. What steps will the Secretary of State take to ensure that children like those in my constituency receive the speech and language support that they need?

My hon. Friend is right to highlight how important it is that all of our children have strong speech and language skills. That is why this Government will roll out early language interventions to make sure that all of our children get support at the earliest possible point, including extending the Nuffield early language intervention for this academic year, because it is so important that we make a difference when our children are young.

I thank the Secretary of State for her answers so far. People in my constituency of Hexham—one of the largest constituencies in the country—routinely tell me of the struggle they face in enabling their children to access the support they need and the education they are entitled to. Will the Secretary of State or one of her Ministers meet with me to discuss the challenges of accessing SEND education in such a rural constituency?

As the first ever Labour MP for Hexham, my hon. Friend will be a champion of rural communities across the country. I would be more than happy to meet with him—or my hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards will meet with him—to discuss this important concern, which I know many Members wish to discuss.

I thank the Secretary of State for her answer, and for her personal commitment to creating a fairer funding system for children with special educational needs. In that light, she will forgive me if I mention that the East Riding has the lowest high-needs block allocation of any local authority in England. So many people have been genuinely committed to a fairer system in the past. Will the Secretary of State set out how she will achieve that? It is easy to support it in principle, but it is very hard to find a way of delivering it in practice.

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his question, and will make sure that officials engage with him on that point. If there is anything further he would like to share, I will happily look at it. He is right: this is a difficult area, and we need to make sure we get it right. I am determined to deliver a system where all children and young people have every chance and opportunity. Particularly when it comes to SEND support, we will have to work across the House to get to a much stronger and better position for our children and families.

What is the Secretary of State going to do about the capacity crisis that is rapidly emerging as tens of thousands of children are being forced out of independent schools by this Government’s deeply misguided VAT policy? I have a list of 20 schools in Buckinghamshire with no places whatsoever, and Bristol city council is considering buying places from an independent school to put back in that school, at taxpayers’ expense, a child who recently left that school at the parents’ expense.

We were elected on a manifesto of driving high and rising standards in our state schools. The public back our policy. We think it is right that we prioritise investment in our state schools where the vast majority of our children go to school, including the vast majority of children in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency. I suggest that he spends a bit more time thinking about their interests.

I welcome the Secretary of State’s commitment to improve the provision of SEND services in schools, but does she recognise that many ordinary, hard-working families make extraordinary efforts to find provision ahead of a formal assessment in independent schools as well? Will she commit to making an assessment of what levels of provision currently exist within the independent sector to satisfy special educational needs, because it will be material to the solution she will need to develop?

As the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Stephen Morgan), has set out, we will make sure that, where children have an education, health and care plan, the VAT on fees policy change will not affect those children. I recognise the point the right hon. Member makes and I believe that parents have a right to choose where their children go to school, but the vast majority of parents in our country who send their children to state school are also ambitious and aspirational for their children.

Maria, in my constituency, has a son who was in a specialist placement, and in October last year that school said it could no longer meet his need. Since then, he has not been back in full-time education, while another headteacher keeps telling me that special needs provision in Shropshire is decades behind elsewhere in the country. If the Secretary of State aspires for all children in the country to have their special needs met, how is she going to ensure that happens in places that are struggling so much with funding, such as Shropshire?

I recognise the challenge the hon. Lady sets out, and part of it is making sure that our mainstream schools are better able to cater for children with a wide range of needs. I am very sorry to hear about the experience of her constituent, and I am sure my hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards will be happy to meet her or to look into that further to see if any action can be taken to support the family.

In Leicestershire, special educational needs has been a real problem that I have seen in my constituency. The last Government made it one of the trailblazers to come together and trial some of the new things that could be done in special educational needs, and we started to see some progress in that. Will the Secretary of State meet me and the other Leicestershire MPs to discuss how we can take that forward, so we can get better provision for Hinckley and Bosworth and for Leicestershire?

The hon. Gentleman is right to draw attention to any emerging evidence that shows new ways of doing things. As a new Government, we are keen to do precisely what he describes to make sure, particularly when it comes to a better join-up between health and education, that we see faster improvement. I would be happy to meet him and Leicestershire colleagues, although my hon. Friend the Minister might be able to step in.

Too many Eastbourne parents, my mum included, are forced to relentlessly fight to get their children into the school that can best meet their children’s special educational needs. That is so often down to a lack of funding, so will the Secretary of State commit to meeting Eastbourne families, Eastbourne school leaders and me to hear about the SEND landscape locally, and provide the funding that local children with special educational needs need and deserve?

The hon. Member is right in his characterisation of a system that is adversarial and where so many parents have to fight to get a good education and support for their children. I would be happy to do so, or perhaps my hon. Friend the Minister might take that meeting.

I call the shadow Minister.

It was in response to growing demand that the last Conservative Government increased the high-needs budget to £10.5 billion and put in place a statutory override so that SEND-related deficits did not overwhelm council budgets. With that set to expire in 2026, what is the Secretary of State’s message to local authorities: is she pushing the Chancellor to extend that protection or for deficits to be written off?

I am genuinely surprised that the hon. Gentleman thinks that question is a source of strength. It represents significant failure over 14 years that we have ended up in such a desperate position facing our councils. We will of course look closely at all of this but, after 14 years when he will have heard that families have been terribly let down by the last Government, a period of reflection on his part might be in hand.