Contact’s social care asks

We believe the disabled children’s social care needs urgent reform in terms of the law, workforce and funding.

The current social care system

Good quality social care allows disabled children to thrive and families to sustain their parenting and caring roles. Timely, high-quality support can prevent a child’s needs from escalating and families reaching crisis point.

But social care in England is failing disabled children and young people.

Families share with us negative experiences after seeking help from children’s social care services. For too long, disabled children’s social care has focussed on safeguarding rather on the support. That means families are denied support when social workers find no evidence of neglect or abuse. Parents describe a culture of parent blame when they seek help

Others see hard won social care direct payments clawed by local authorities back because they are unable to find suitably trained personal assistants to work with their child. And the Law Commission describes routes to accessing support for parent carers of disabled children “unnecessarily complicated”.

Law commission reform of disabled children’ social care

We welcome the Law Commission’s autumn 2024 review of disabled children’s social care and the Education Committee’s report which call on the Department for Education to implement the Law Commission’s proposals. This includes proposals to fix the system in line with our “asks”, such as a single duty to assess disabled children and national eligibility criteria for accessing support.

The Law Commission plans to publish a report in September 2025 on its consultation on the proposals.

It will take several years to reform the law, and families seeking help under the current system need help now. That is why we are also calling for changes that could happen immediately, including greater investment in the disabled children’s workforce and disabled children’s social care.

Our social care asks

Below, we share what we want to see improve.

Reform of social care law

We are pleased to see the Law Commission’s proposals for reform include our key asks, which are:

  1. A separate social care assessment pathway for disabled children and an end the culture of parent blame.
  2. National eligibility criteria for disabled children’s social care support.
  3. A requirement for staff assessing disabled children to have disability training and expertise.

Other measures to improve social care for disabled children

  1. Address the £573m shortfall in funding for disabled children’s services and double the funding for the Short Breaks Innovation Fund.
  2. More flexibility for direct payments, allowing parent carers to use them to pay a family member to care for their child or pay for an activity.
  3. Expand and improve training for the disabled children’s social care workforce.
  4. Increase access to advice on rights and entitlements help families navigate the social care system and secure support.
  5. A strengthened system of accountability to ensure local authorities comply with their social care legal obligations to disabled children.
  6. Improved joint commissioning of support through better co-production with families.

Download a detailed explanation of our social care asks.

Our social care advice

Parent and child sitting on a coach smiling with families occupying other seats in the background

Social care

As a parent of a disabled child you are entitled to certain services to help.

Find out more
A woman with short hair and a black jacket embraces a young boy in a gray hoodie. They are indoors, standing in front of a red table with papers and a whiteboard. The boy looks up at the woman, and they both wear pin badges. The background includes a mural and brick column.

Needs assessments

An overview of the process social services used to decide how much support you and your child need and how to get one.

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Carer’s assessments: your needs as a carer

Advice on asking for a carer’s assessment, what the assessment looks like and what happens after the assessment.

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