A seminal report(with link to https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/send-old-issues-new-issues-next-steps please) entitled “SEND: old issues, new issues, next steps” was published last week by Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission.
The report looks at the experiences of disabled children and young people in ten local areas, in the context of the reforms introduced by the Children and Families Act 2014 and of the pandemic.
Alarmingly, the report concludes that there are long-standing issues in the SEND system, which have been highlighted and intensified by the pandemic.
The report mentions a widespread lack of ambition for children and young people with labels of SEND. This is all the more worrying in the context of rising numbers of children being given such labels, often inappropriately as the report suggests. For example underachievement, sometimes due to a poorly designed or taught curriculum, is sometimes wrongly labelled as ‘SEND’. Similarly, speech, language and communication needs may be misunderstood as moderate learning difficulties.
During the first lockdown many children with labels of SEND did not attend school or college. Some received remote education and coped with it well, while others did not. In autumn 2020 some but not all returned to school or college. Of those who did, some received a narrower curriculum than usual. Others were simply not receiving education. Important healthcare also ceased, for example some children and young people did not receive physiotherapy, leaving them immobile and/or in pain.
Such lack of health and care provision, alongside inconsistent educational provision and long waiting times for assessments, all had an impact on children and young people’s physical and mental health.
By spring 2021 concerns had intensified and many children and young people were feeling isolated and lonely.
Looking back, it is clear that all local areas had to adapt their way of working, in order to provide services for children and young people with labels of SEND. The report clearly states that the success with which they adapted seemed to be closely related to the quality of their work before the pandemic.
This is not new. CSIE’s series of reports(with link to http://www.csie.org.uk/resources/free.shtml#trends2019 please) on local authorities school placement trends(with link to https://sen-england.shinyapps.io/csie-trends/ please) has repeatedly shown the existence of a ‘postcode lottery’, with significant differences in how local authorities implement national law and policy.
The report concludes that further reform to the SEND system has become even more urgent than it was before the pandemic.
CSIE is deeply concerned about these findings. At the same time we hope that, by making these problems explicit, this report may pave the way to a new normal, where disabled children and young people are better respected and better supported in education, and are able to experience real equality of opportunity.
