Special needs support promises more parent power
Support for young people in England with special educational needs faces a major overhaul. The government wants to replace the current complex system of statements of need with a simpler, more family-friendly assessment. Parents of special needs children are also being promised control over support budgets by 2014.
But teachers' union leader Mary Bousted warned that reforms could be undermined by spending cuts. There could also be a bigger role for voluntary groups in providing services. The proposals, set out in a Green Paper, are being claimed as the biggest shake up for special needs education for three decades.
They are intended to make the support system less confusing and "adversarial" and to help parents feel that they are not always having to "battle" to get the services they need. The system of statements - setting out the details of what help is needed for individual children - is to be replaced by a single assessment process.
At present, about 2.7% of children in England, with severe, profound or multiple health and learning needs, have such a statement. The proposed system aims to address children's needs in a more integrated way, bringing together schools, health and social care.
The government also proposes scrapping the two categories which cover the majority of children with special needs - school action and school action plus". These would be replaced by a school-based scheme, aimed at raising. This reflects concerns that the label of special educational needs can be applied too broadly, losing focus on those children with the greatest need.
Children's Minister Sarah Teather said she wanted to reduce the sense that parents were being frustrated by the system. "We have heard time and time again that parents are frustrated with endless delays to getting the help their child needs, and by being caught in the middle when local services don't work together," she said.
The chief executive of the National Autistic Society, Mark Lever, said parents too often had to "fight huge battles to have their child's needs recognised, understood and met".
But Mary Bousted, general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, warned that the promise of extra support would be undermined by the scale of spending cuts. "Savage cuts are already being made to many of the specialist services teachers rely on to help them support children with special educational needs. Educational psychologists and speech and language therapists are being made redundant as local authorities cut their funding following budget cuts from government."
Labour's education spokesman Andy Burnham welcomed the proposals for a simpler system, but he said because of cuts to educational support services "these noble aims seem hopelessly out of touch with the reality on the ground. The Green Paper sets out a vision of integrated services but the Tory-led government's own health and education reforms make that harder," he said