Greater scrutiny of local authority decision-making after report into education of children with SEN and disability

There needs to be a radical recasting of the relationship between parents, schools and local authorities to ensure a clearer focus on the outcomes and life chances for children with special educational needs and disability, a government-commissioned inquiry has said.

The final Lamb Inquiry report – Special Educational Needs and Parental Confidence – found that in many cases the system works well. However, “the education system is living with a legacy of a time when children with SEN were seen as uneducable” and that “while the aims of the SEN framework remain relevant, implementation has too often failed to live up to them”.

Brian Lamb, who led the inquiry, said the cultural change needed would not be straightforward to implement but should deliver greater ambition for society’s most vulnerable children and greater engagement with parents.

He called for change in four areas:

• Placing children’s outcomes at the heart of the system: this would include tackling the culture of low expectations for children with SEN and ensuring the best teachers and best-targeted resources are put towards those most in need. The Achievement for All pilots, which are currently running in ten local authorities and 460 schools, demonstrate how this can be achieved;
• A stronger voice for parents: where things go wrong, “the root causes can often be traced to poor communication between school, local authority and parent”. In this respect, the introduction of the Aiming High for Disabled Children Core Offer principles will bring about “a profound cultural change” in the way schools and local authorities relate to parents;
• A system with a greater focus on children’s needs: the greater delegation of responsibility and funding to schools “has the risk that some local authorities are too far removed from how services are being delivered”. Local authorities, operating within Children’s Trusts, need to do more in commissioning services to ensure schools are able to provide specialist expert support early. New guidance on the writing of statements should be published and consideration should be given to making the assessment system more independent and easily accessible;
• A more accountable system that delivers better services: accountability needs to be built into the system “at every level, from what children tell us through to national systems of monitoring and redress”. Access to justice should be made possible, especially for those parents least equipped financially or in terms of personal resources.

Lamb concluded: “It is not the current framework that is at fault but rather the failure to comply with both the spirit and the letter of the framework.”

Announcing a package of measures in response to the report, Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families Ed Balls said he agreed with Lamb’s call for a more ambitious approach to children with SEN and disabilities.

A new pilot will be launched to scrutinise local authority decision-making in a bid to give parents more confidence that decisions are made in the best interests of their child. There will also be strengthened independent appeals panels and improved statutory guidance for schools on excluding children with SEN. All advisors of Parent Partnership Services will be trained in SEN and disability law.

Funding initiatives have also been announced for the Local Government Ombudsman to receive complaints and for the Anti-Bullying Alliance to tackle SEN and disability-related bullying.

Balls said: “Brian Lamb’s report tells us that parents must have access to the information they need, when they need it, in ways that are convenient to them. That’s why we are launching a dedicated advice helpline, giving parents somewhere to turn for information and support. Where parents aren’t happy with the system, they will be able to complain to the Local Government Ombudsman.”