1998 was a year when stronger positions were taken on inclusion as an increasing number of education authorities took steps to support more disabled children in mainstream schools. Proposals by many LEAs around the country reached the pages of newspapers and journals. The pro-inclusion LEAS included Sunderland, East Sussex, Somerset, Nottingham, Kingston upon Hull, Bolton, Harrow, Greenwich, Warwickshire, Merton, Calderdale, Bradford, Tameside, Gloucestershire, and Walsall.

Many of the moves towards inclusion were at the early planning stages, but the closure of at least one special school was reported and action took place of various kinds to increase and improve mainstream services for disabled children. Improvements included lowering ceilings to make education more accessible for hearing impaired pupils and making adaptations for wheelchair users. In one local authority, county councillors questioned the pace of inclusion and sought guarantees that no child would be moved into mainstream without full provision. It was also revealed that only a small proportion of authorities funded an intensive therapy for autistic children known as the Lovaas method. Meanwhile Sheffield Council had to pay for a place in a private school for a pupil with hearing impairment after the Special Educational Needs Tribunal ruled that her needs could not be met in the crowded state sector.

Concerns about the provision of appropriate mainstream support were at their strongest in Sunderland where a row over the closure of Barbara Priestman Special School hit the headlines on a regular basis. However, despite widespread Press coverage calling for the school to remain open, it became clear that not everybody was against changes to the city’s separate special school system. At the beginning of 1998 Sunderland Council was criticised for being ‘obsessed with inclusion’ but as the year came to a close, new complaints emerged that the Council was being ‘too selective’ about which children should move to mainstream.

As well as commenting widely on the Government’s pro-inclusion approach to special education reform, parents also made their often contrasting views known over a range of other issues including statementing procedures for children with special eductional needs and parents’ right to a school of their choice. A Belfast mother said she was prepared to go to prison if she was forced to send her son to a separate special school and a Sunderland family fought for the right not to be included. One couple was so determined that their disabled daughter would not attend special school that they moved home to find an inclusive school. And another mother, having won the battle for her son to remain in mainstream, confessed that fundraising to pay for an educational assistant to support him was becoming stressful.

Pupils themselves met the Education Secretary, David Blunkett, in London to demand a change in the law to end compulsory segregation in special schools. Also focusing on legislation, there was a call for the Disability Discrimination Act to be extended to cover education and campaigners refused to accept Camden Council’s explanation that it was high costs – not deliberate intentions – which prevented the authority making all schools accessible. They said such an ‘appalling’ attitude would not be regarded as a reasonable defence under the Equal Pay or Race Relations Acts.