Education secretary Kit Malthouse has promised the government will produce a SEND improvement plan before Christmas following the Green Paper consultation, sector leaders have been told.
Department for Education officials are understood to be looking at what changes can be made to the system straightaway following the plans announced through the government’s long-awaited SEND review.
Dame Christine Lenehan, director of the Council for Disabled Children, told a panel discussion at the Tes SEND Show this morning that the commitment for an improvement plan before Christmas had been made by the new education secretary.
André Imich, SEN and disability professional adviser for the DfE, also told the event that Mr Malthouse was committed to taking the Green Paper forward.
Speaking to Tes at the event, Dame Christine said: “Kit Malthouse has committed to an improvement paper, an improvement plan being produced following the SEND Green Paper consultation before Christmas.”
She added that there had been some concern in the sector that the political uncertainty of recent months could affect the SEND Green Paper’s implementation.
She said: “People need to feel after the consultation that they have been heard. I think officials [in the DfE] know that the concerns in the SEND sector are so important that the system cannot be left in a vacuum.”
Dame Christine said sector leaders have been given an undertaking that an improvement paper would be published by the DfE before Christmas. She said officials were working to see what changes can be introduced as soon as possible.
There have been doubts raised about whether the government will get any new education legislation through the current Parliament following months of political upheaval.
The SEND Green Paper was launched in March this year with a series of proposals to transform the system, followed by a public consultation, which was extended after concerns were raised about a lack of accessible versions of the documents.
Proposals included:
- A new national framework for councils for banding and tariffs of high needs, which the government claims will offer clarity on the level of support expected, and put the system on a financially sustainable footing in the future.
- Standardising and digitising the process of applying for education, health and care plans (EHCPs).
- Changing the culture and practice in mainstream education to be more inclusive and better at identifying and supporting needs, including through earlier intervention and improved targeted support.
- Improving workforce training through the introduction of a new Sendco NPQ for school Sendcos and increasing the number of staff with an accredited level 3 qualification in early years settings.
Mr Imich told the Tes SEND Show that the Green Paper consultation has had 6,000 responses. He said there had been strong support for the proposals to standardise the EHCP process, which he said people seem to regard as a “no-brainer”.
There has since been months of political upheaval as the Conservatives changed leader and four different people have held the post of education secretary.
It was announced last week that minister Kelly Tolhurst will be leading on SEND as the schools and childhood minister after a reshuffle by new prime minister Liz Truss.
