Contact responds to another report highlighting the SEND emergency

2 mins read

Wednesday 15 January 2025

Tags: special educational needs, schools, disabled children


Today the Public Accounts Committee has published its report into the SEND emergency together with recommendations for addressing it.


Angie Fenn, Contact’s Head of Information and Advice, said: “Today’s report from the Public Accounts Committee highlights what families with disabled children have been telling us for many years. There is overwhelming evidence of the SEND system in crisis. What we need now are urgent solutions and the committee’s recommendations and deadlines are welcome. Better data about the growing need and future planning of support services is essential. We have long called for education, health and social care to work more closely to provide support to disabled children so they are helped both in and out of school. We are hopeful that a clearer idea of what inclusion looks like and how it will be resourced will come from the Education Select Committee’s much needed SEND inquiry.”


Contact’s SEN policy lead Imogen Steele will give evidence to the Education Select Committee’s SEND Crisis inquiry later this month. We will ensure parents views are represented, reporting information and experiences we receive on our helpline and other frontline services.


Contact’s three asks to improve the SEND system offer solutions to the SEND crisis. We’d like to see duties placed on schools to provide a certain level of special educational support to ensure more children have their needs met without the need for an EHC plan. We need greater accountability in the system. And investment in schools’ special education workforce is also urgent. The recent moves to train and recruit more educational psychologists are welcome.


The Public Accounts Committee also published data on Education Health and Care Plans, which shows huge discrepancies between each local authority area. For example in Portsmouth just 1.6% of EHCPs are issued in the 20 week timeframe, but in neighbouring Southampton it is 100%. In Derbyshire 17.8% are done in the timeframe, with neighbouring Nottinghamshire on 32.3%.


The account committee rightly says that “rates of even 80 and 90% should be considered inadequate given the uncertainty and anxiety the delays can create for families.”