Education secretary Bridget Phillipson has urged “for a bit of patience” as they work out how to fix the broken SEND system, but said she wants to help mainstream schools run their own special needs provision.
Phillipson told a webinar today that they are “serious” about reforming the system, but there’s “not a silver bullet here”.
She said: “I would just urge for a bit of patience as we try and work through what that reform plan will look like.”
A SEND review looking at the crisis-hit system was first launched in 2019, with a much-delayed SEND and alternative provision plan finally published in 2023. The previous government had begun testing the reforms but no nationwide roll-out had started.
Mainstream schools running more SEND provision
Government wants mainstream schools to become more inclusive, with special schools catering for those with the most complex needs. But they have yet to say what their overarching plan would be.
Phillipson did indicate what could be within her government’s reforms. She pointed to mainstream schools working “against the grain” to deliver more specialist provision within their own schools.
“We are looking at how we can try and do that in a more co-ordinated and strategic way because government previously had not been involved in that conversation in the way that they should.”
Some councils have already been opening more specialist provision in mainstream schools. For instance, Norfolk is working to open 50 specialist resource bases by 2027.
Phillipson also said there is “more that could be shared between specialist and mainstream provision because there is some fantastic work going on within the specialist sector that I think staff working in the mainstream settings would find really useful in terms of their training and development”.
‘National conversation needed on SEND’
She added government is doing short and medium term work – such as investment in speech and language support and training educational psychologists.
But added: “I think longer term we do need to look at the system overall because I hear time and again that it’s broken, that it isn’t working and that we need to make it better.
“But I am so conscious that this is really complex, that given how fraught it is at the moment and given how adversarial the system is and given how hard people have to fight to get what they need for their children, the last thing I would want to do would be to compound that.”
A “national conversation about the kind of system we want to deliver” is needed, she said, adding that it has to involve health colleagues.
She added: “We are serious about it, I am determined to do it, but I think as far as possible what I’ve said in the House of Commons is that I would like to do this on a cross party basis because I think there is shared concern about the system that we have and I think a shared recognition that we need to do things differently and better.
“But I do want to listen to parents, to staff, to those representing children’s interests, the interests of disabled people, to make sure we get this right and we will before too long have more to say about the shape of that and how we do it.”
So why are so many send kids being offrolled from mainstream school, punished and put
In constant isolation and parents/ carers being threatened with fines when it’s repeatedly advertised
That the system is broken. The education system as
It is drives segregation, fuels the mental health crisis and creates a lost generation.
Patience? I’ve been fighting to get my son help in school for 5 years. He’s 11! Nearly half his life !!! His current school can only provide an hour a day for him. The rest of the time he’s home, learning patience apparently!
Main stream would be good for some but not without all primary staff actually listening to teachers assistants and early years providers. Early years can deal with multiple age ranges and abilities with higher ratio than schools but as soon as this is passed on to schooling due to lack of knowledge and staff prejudices to how early years operate they scrap all that intervention and start again because they know better apparently. I am an early years professional who had to leave 26 years of work and, 10 years in a special early years setting to look after my 2 autistic twins as mainstream is not inclusive and is not the right environment that will help them thrive. I don’t feel having to access learning away from peers with little to no support in mainstream with the little that gets given to mainstream over special needs provisions at primary age. The main difference is knowledge and understanding of needs in a mainstream that is below what is needed. The training is a joke regardless as I learnt more in a special needs preschool working along side other trained like minded professionals that wanted to better childrens experiences and would go above and beyond for less pay than teachers day in day out. Every resourse we fundraised for. You can’t fix primary untill primary schools except that they are more about ticking boxes for govermant statistics to be able to get more money than it will ever be about what is needed. It’s maddening. My twins now have to wait till Oct 2025 for the appeal for their school place setting. Patience she says that’s a bloody understatement from my side of the fence.
Mainstream schools don’t have the skills or systems. This is about money saving not addressing the issue.
An article here last week talked of children 7 years below expected outcomes in main stream secondary with Send provision for Half their lessons. What are they doing for the other half when 7 years behind year 7 has then only just able to count to 10 hardly able to read and write. But they are just on normal secondary classes.
The behaviour of schools and children’s services and insight into these issues from health is sorely lacking kids forced out of school or parents blamed and fined when the children can’t cope it’s disgusting the way it is now
We The parents have been patient enough!
Here we go, another person who thinks they know best but actually don’t, it’s laughable
Another test coming up! Give it a break, how about you listen to the parents for once, the people who actually know their children more than any so called ‘expert’ claims to do.
I hope Bridget Phillipson also understands that for some children this idea of mainstream being inclusive for all is being used for the benefit of the LA and to save money in the first instance and does not focus on what is best for the child
My son who’s been out of school now since March was put into a mainstream with a low coin unit because of his diagnosis of DLD. The senior school in question upon consultation with the LA stated that my son needed more specialist setting due to his learning ability and that a mainstream even with a lowcoin would not be in my sons best interests.
The LA put him there anyways and my son has suffered mentally for there poor judgement which has left my outgoing happy fun child traumatized. We even questioned the placement and we’re told it was adequate!!!
He has had assessments recently which have been done privately which shows he has severe language impairment and for a child learning 2-3 years below his peers and classed as vulnerable this inclusivity for all isn’t always in the child’s best interests.
I have a 4 year old child with ASD he’s just started mainstream thus September cannot cope and has regressed back into nappies.
The current SEND system is beyond broken it needs a complete overhaul with a view to helping the child and families of our SEND children navigate the education system efficiently and to not put budget and cost before the emotional wellbeing of our children. Enough is enough…