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.”
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.”
