There are two primary policies that laid the (unintended) foundations for the current state of the SEND system in England:

• The way in which former secretary of state for education Michael Gove implemented his focus on the improvement of academic outcomes and attainment in mainstream schools.
• The austerity agenda, specifically its impact on local government resourcing.

Let’s take the focus on academic outcomes in mainstream schools first.

SEND and curriculum

From 2010, there was an overt focus on the academic importance of the curriculum, with a move away from elements such as coursework to 100 per cent testing and a ramping up of content. This was more challenging for some pupils and put a greater focus on recall rather than a broader assessment of skills.

This change came into place alongside a movement toward models of high compliance/zero dissent responses of behaviour management, particularly in secondary education. The shift made it much harder to implement reasonable adjustments and much easier to explain why they could not be made.

At a system level, the government’s agenda was distributed through the forced academisation of schools, typically into larger trusts that were dominated by leaders in synch with the new orthodoxy of school as laid out above.

Outcomes for schools

This new approach, while lauded for pushing outcomes in England up the Programme for International Student Assessment rankings, has had the unintended consequence of pushing a statistically small, but also disproportionately high-cost, number of learners to the margins of our mainstream system, and - all too often - out of it completely.

This is not the fault of the academy system: that was established to respond to poor performance in schools, however that is defined. Where the issue lies is in how “good” performance has been defined by politicians and policymakers.

In most cases, decisions will not have been conscious: if you’re forced to teach to the test, then the context you have to set (even in an inclusive-values school) will be one that a number of pupils will struggle with, and which results in disengagement and alienation for some.

SEND diagnoses

The vast majority, if not all, of the students who have lost out in this new dynamic are those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) - and those who, because of the way the system is constructed, have come to be defined as having SEND.

For example, if you are a boy and were born in the summer, you are almost twice as likely to be diagnosed with SEND as an autumn-born girl. In terms of children with an education, health and care plan (EHCP) who were in mainstream settings in spring 2024, there were over 5,000 more children in primary than at key stages 3 and 4. We know that the Year 6 to Year 7 transition is now a key point where children come into the specialist sector, but that needn’t be the case.

Austerity and education

Now let’s look at austerity.

The real-terms reduction in school budgets for the period 2010-2017 led more schools to seek additional resources to meet the needs of vulnerable learners, and reduce the level of support within the baseline offer.

The only way additional funding could be secured (though not guaranteed) was via the EHCP - previously statement of special educational needs - process, which therefore pushed schools down a route of medicalising a vulnerable learner and obtaining a SEND diagnosis for them.

In turn, this placed a duty on local authorities to assess need but - as a consequence of huge funding cuts - local authorities didn’t have the resources to effectively discharge this duty.

SEND tribunals

By 2014, it was possible for this failure to be challenged legally by parents, but those same local authorities had even fewer resources to assess needs, or to obtain effective legal advice and representation.

So the system we have now encourages - and indeed, financially rewards - schools when pupils get a SEND diagnosis, while those left to gatekeep this - the local authorities - have insufficient resources to respond to the demand.

There are many mainstream schools that do truly inspirational work to support pupils and families where there are additional needs, especially in primary schools, yet the dysfunctions within the system outlined here make that harder and limit what is possible.

Next steps for SEND

How should we approach fixing this mess?

1. Review the existing mainstream schools’ accountability measures, taking into consideration the unintended consequences and costs that they have on the SEND system.
2. Carefully consider the unintended consequences that may arise with the development of the Ofsted schools’ scorecard, and remove any further contributors to poor inclusion.
3. Ensure the Department for Health and Social Care provides meaningful funding to cover the cost of SEND in local areas, and that the services it commissions via NHS England are included in the holistic review of service quality and improvement.
4. Ensure that the new nursery enhancement programme has a SEND-specific early intervention strand.
5. Cease the Safety Valve and Delivering Better Value in SEND programmes immediately.
6. Amend the Children and Families Act to remove the tribunal route for all but exceptional cases, and consider instead having the local government ombudsman play an arbitration role, with schools given equal voice in that process to those of families and local authorities.
7. Consider the establishment of regional SEND commissioning agencies, with a transfer of responsibility from local authorities and integrated care boards.
8. Ensure the current level of high-needs spending is fully funded by the government, with inflationary adjustments forecast in to recognise the reality of cost commitments.
9. Review the current funding arrangements for special and alternative provision (AP) schools and provide an uplift of place funding (which has been static since 2013). Also cease the real-terms funding cuts to special and AP schools, enabled in the High Needs Operational Guidance, and give the state sector the financial security and sustainability it needs - mirroring percentage increases in mainstream schools - so that it can play a more active part in reducing the current dependence on high-cost independent placements. This, in turn, will provide huge cost avoidance for the state.

Warren Carratt is CEO of Nexus multi-academy trust

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