Being a mother of four, three of whom have additional needs, I go to work to get a break. There is no work harder than parenting. That is true for raising any child, but it is multiplied many times over when you have disabled children. I am not only a carer, but must also be an advocate, sometimes a campaigner, fighting to try and get my children the support they so desperately need and yet is often so woefully hard to secure.
Since my youngest son started primary school in 2023, I have been fighting to ensure that physical restraint, seclusion and suspensions are not part of his everyday diet. I hope the sorts of things he’s faced since then—absconding from the school on multiple occasions when aged only six; being dared by his peers to do risky things like lick toilet seats; being held in “calm spaces” against his will for long periods of time —are rare, but I fear that’s not the case. This struggle has pushed me to my limits, physically and mentally. It was due to abject failures to meet his needs that I briefly returned to smoking last year, a habit I thought I had relegated to my 20s.
And so, both as a parent who has had to navigate the system and as a social policy expert, I awaited this week’s publication of the schools white paper, which proposes reform to Special educational needs (Send) provision, with keen anticipation. The prime minister and education secretary know much depends on getting this right: not just their political futures, but nothing less than the future of a whole cohort of children who, with real support, could enjoy fulfilling school years that set them up for adulthood.
I hope we can all agree that the current system is broken. All too often, mainstream schools are unable to give adequate support to Send pupils. There is both a dearth of vital resources and a lack of understanding regarding what it means to offer an inclusive education. The more specialist provision, either through resources in the mainstream system or special schools, is so over-subscribed that it can be impossible to access. And while Education Health and Care Plans (EHCPs—provided to some Send children following a needs assessment by their local council) do provide statutory protection, there is often a mismatch between what is detailed on the plan and what is actually provided by the setting named. Any redress can be incredibly difficult to secure, often taking months, if not years, to materialise.
While children and young people are routinely being failed, parents are sometimes pushed into poverty when the inadequacies of the education offer means they have no choice but to give up work and homeschool their child; or when adversarial systems take too great a toll on their mental health.
My own children are educated in Bradford, where the most recent Ofsted inspection of Send provision found a number of significant and damning failings. I have gone so far as to beg my son’s headteacher to permanently exclude him, knowing that this may be the only way to secure a place for him in a more appropriate setting.
When I am not busy fighting for my son, I lead Changing Realities, a collaboration of more than 200 parents and carers on a low income, researchers at the University of Glasgow and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and the Child Poverty Action Group. In advance of the white paper’s release, we met several times with Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, and her team.
At these meetings, parents set out the principles they believe should guide effective Send reform. These include not removing statutory support for children before real improvements are made to mainstream provision, as well as joining up what are too often treated as isolated policy agendas. Send intersects very closely with health, poverty, disadvantage and the growing concern over opportunities for young people when they leave compulsory education. If mission-led government is to mean anything, surely it should move away from silo-ed policymaking. The government could ensure, for example, that parents of Send children do not risk sanctions from the Department for Work and Pensions when they miss an appointment with their work coach because their child has been sent home from school.
Parents do want to see more inclusive mainstream schools, and on this there is much to welcome in the white paper. The government has pledged a £4bn investment over the next three years in an effort to “make every mainstream school truly inclusive”, and a new “Experts at Hand” programme, which will aim to give schools better access to specialists, such as speech and language therapists and educational psychologists. This is a good start, but the government will likely have to go further, and faster, if it is to achieve this ambitious agenda. The scale of change required for every school to prioritise the inclusion of pupils with additional needs demands a wholehearted cultural shift across the education system. This must be underpinned by a shared belief: that we all stand to benefit when inclusion is prioritised.
The additional investment promised is clearly a positive, as is the commitment to halve the attainment gap between kids with and without additional needs. The sequencing of the reform process, with statutory entitlement protected until 2030, is a relief. But the proposal to review entitlement to provision under EHCPs when a child finishes primary school, just as they prepare to make the transition to secondary, makes little sense. That is an incredibly anxious time for children with additional needs, and for their parents. Building in another layer of anxiety seems counterproductive.
The review of that entitlement will start from September 2029, affecting those currently in year two, including my youngest son. The consultation process should lead to a rethink here, so that any changes to entitlement happen once, and only once, children with Send have moved to secondary school. And, even with this, risks remain. Reducing statutory provision is inherently dangerous, given how other political parties, especially on the right, may take this agenda forwards in the years to come.
Phillipson must embark on this process with an openness to learning from the real experts—parents and carers, young people themselves, teachers and specialist staff, and those leading educational settings. It has long felt as if we have all been battling each other, with parents pitted against schools and local authorities. The result has been the fraying of relationships and the erosion of trust.
So as a parent, and as a social policy academic, I will do all I can to ensure the white paper truly is a turning point. Like the work of parenting, it will be hard. But it will be worth it.
