Education Committee SEND report: What the Government needs to do to fix system - and it's not scrapping EHCPs

• A new report has made official recommendations on how the Government can solve the SEND crisis
• It slams the current system as ‘chronically letting down children and families’
• The report advises against scrapping EHCPs, focusing on reducing demand
• It also calls for funding for schools to increase in line with inflation, instead of staying stuck at its 2014 rate
• The Government is expected to publish a plan for SEND reform soon - and says it’s working closely with families

A new report aimed at solving the ‘SEND crisis’ is calling for a culture shift and more funding - to make mainstream education genuinely inclusive for all pupils.

The Parliamentary Education Select Committee has now published the results of its months-long inquiry to find the biggest problems with the support available and systems in place for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) in England’s schools. It also features its official recommendations for Government, on how it should go about fixing them.

It comes after the National Audit Office – the Government’s spending watchdog – last year found that the current SEND system was “not achieving value for money”. Nor was it leading to better outcomes for children, despite spending increasing 58% over the past decade to £10.7 billion a year.

Education Committee chair and MP Helen Hayes said they knew when they first launched their enquiry “that the SEND system was broken, long past needing repair, and chronically letting down children, their families and their teachers”. But she said making sure every child in the country with SEND can attend a local school that meets their needs will require “a root and branch transformation” – one which will require national standards around what kind of support schools have to offer.

The Government is reportedly set to publish a plan for reforming the ailing system sometime this autumn. But controversially, officials previously haven’t ruled out limiting or doing away with Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs), which experts say is the only legally enforceable ways for many families to get their child extra support at school.

But what exactly were the issues the Committee found, and how does it suggest the Government go about solving them? Here’s everything you need you know:

1. Actually define what ‘inclusive’ education means

The Government has said its intention was to improve the SEND system by enabling most children to have their needs met “in inclusive, mainstream education settings”. But the Committee said that it didn’t actually have a clear definition of what ‘inclusive’ mainstream education means.

Among its recommendations, it suggested that the Department for Education (DfE) create and publish one within the next three months – along with “a clear rationale and examples of good practice” for schools.

2. Make SEN support consistent – no matter where you live

The Committee said that currently, the inconsistency in support across different parts of England was “unacceptable”. It meant that in some areas, children with SEN were receiving much less help than others, or were facing long delays before their needs were identified – both of which were driving up the need for EHCPs.

It said that national standards must be introduced without delay to establish clear, enforceable expectations nationwide. These would need to include statutory requirements detailing the minimum staffing, training, and equipment that every school must have access to for SEN support. It also recommended that schools should start providing this support when children needed it, even if they were still waiting on an official diagnosis.

3. Reduce demand for EHCPs – but don’t scrap them

The rising level of demand for EHCPs was unsustainable, the Committee heard. Many families sought them out because they were often the only legally enforceable way to get their child the help they needed to thrive at school.

But it said that the Government shouldn’t respond to the current challenges by getting rid of them, and should instead focus on better meeting children’s needs at earlier stages – through more targeted SEN support or schools’ ordinary provision. Evidence showed that schools practicing “real inclusivity” generated fewer EHCPs, as they met students' needs without them, it added.

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4. Better training for teachers and support staff

To make mainstream education truly inclusive, the Committee said a whole-school approach would be needed. This meant that all front-line staff needed to be equipped with the training and resources they needed to respond effectively to their pupils’ diverse needs.

It suggested that the DfE should change the rules, so that at least one member of every school’s senior leadership team should hold a qualification in coordinating SEN support. Within four years, it suggested all new headteachers had one as well.

It also recommended that teaching and learning support assistants be paid more – and that both the DfE and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) should develop dedicated SEND workforce plans. Council staff should also be trained on mediation skills, child development and SEND law, the recommendations added, “with a focus on the best interests of the child”.

5. Create a more sustainable funding model

The report said that the DfE currently expects the SEND needs of most children in mainstream education to be met with up to £6,000 of funding provided to their school. But this figure was introduced back in 2014.

The Committee said this was “inadequate”. It instead said funding should be automatically increased each year in line with inflation to stop support from eroding any further. The national funding formula as a whole needed an overhaul too, to make sure that the money set aside for each region actually reflected their differences – such as setting aside more money for transport costs in rural areas.

6. A bigger role for the NHS

The panel also heard that SEND wasn’t given enough focus by DHSC and NHS services, which felt “completely separate” from education. The health sector was also seen by many as being too passive – in what should be active partnerships with schools and councils.

The Committee said that ongoing NHS restructuring should be used as an opportunity to identify SEND as a priority across England’s health system. This needed to be backed by “appropriate financial investment” from the health sector to meet their statutory duties and give families timely access to therapies and assessments.

7. Rebuilding trust and confidence from families

Finally, it said that for upcoming policy reforms to be understood and accepted by the public, there needed to be clear communication from the DfE – and a way to hold schools to account if they weren’t offering an inclusive education for SEN pupils.

To rebuild the trust that has been lost, the Committee said parents and carers needed to be treated as genuine participants in their child's education, and be entitled to participate in discussions and decisions about their child.

The DfE also needed to work with schools watchdog Ofsted to make sure that the new ‘inclusion’ category in its upcoming inspection changes was measurable and robust – and make sure all of its inspectors had proper SEND training so that any gaps in support could be spotted and filled.

What did the Department for Education have to say?

After the report came out last week, a DfE spokesperson told the BBC that it was listening to what families had to say, as it puts together its upcoming planned reforms to “transform outcomes for every child with SEND”.

“The report rightly highlights the need for actions we're already taking, to make sure that evidence-based support is available as routine, without a fight, for every child who needs it,” they continued. “From significant investment in places for children with SEND, to improved teacher training, to our Best Start Family Hubs in every local area.”

Want to learn more about SEND in England’s schools? You can find the Education Committee’s full report, including its findings and recommendations, online here. Or check out our coverage of research from earlier this year on three groups of children whose special educational needs are more likely to go unrecognised.