Agenda item

The Board received a report of the Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services which provided progress across County Durham with SEND services highlighted in the Ofsted and Care Quality Commission (CQC) SEND re-visit in January 2020, and the publication of their letter in March 2020.

The Head of Early Help, Inclusion and Vulnerable Children confirmed that the report covered the progress made since the original SEND inspection in late 2017 following a revisit in January.

He referred to the SEND Action Plan which had been formed in recent months and confirmed that Partners had continued to work together virtually over the last six months.  The plan contained a number of key actions to progress over the forthcoming six to nine months and had taken account of the Covid 19 outbreak and the disruption on children and adults learning, and access to services. 

He noted a positive letter from Vicky Ford MP which had congratulated the Council on the progress that had been made as a partnership on SEND work over last two years.

Councillor J Allen, Portfolio Holder for Transformation, Culture and Tourism, asked for an explanation on what future developments were planned in relation to supporting young people with special education needs and disabilities. 

The Head of Early Help, Inclusion and Vulnerable Children confirmed that supporting children back into their learning after a considerable break was the top priority across the Partnership and a document had been created; Return to School, Safe, Happy and Settled which was updated regularly and provided information on how education providers could be supported.  Many children and young people were anxious about going back to school or had issues that caused difficulties with their return to school.  The action plan covered a number of areas for the Partnership to look at over the next six to nine months, in terms of communications. The Head of Early Help, Inclusion and Vulnerable Children confirmed that further website updates were planned in order for children and families to be able to access the right information.   The work programme had been set out for the designated Clinical Officer in the Integrated Commissioning Team in order to focus on improvements to health advice and for children who with Education Health and Care Plans.

The Head of Early Help, Inclusion and Vulnerable Children confirmed that in addition the SEND Strategy was being updated and there were planned engagement activities with children and families in order to take account of their views and their needs.

Finally with regards to the funding for SEND and the work on the high needs block, the Head of Early Help, Inclusion and Vulnerable Children referred to the issues in Durham regarding the sustainability of funding and the work being done in order to make it sustainable within the resources that were available.  There was ongoing work with regards to lobbying the Government to try and improve the funding for SEND and he referred to Cllr Gunn having recently written to the Secretary of State for Education with regards to funding for children and young people with high needs.

Councillor Gunn confirmed that as Portfolio Holder for Children and Young People’s Services and Adult Learning and Skills, she had written to the Secretary of State to ask for greater funding.  Her first letter had been sent in March and highlighted the pressures on funding for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities and for supporting pupils who were at risk of exclusion.  Some funding had been received from the Government but it was simply not enough.  Although this was a national issue, Councillor Gunn confirmed that during the financial year 2019/20 Durham County Council had to spend £8.6m more than they had received from Government on the High Needs Block allocation and £5.6m was from the Councils’ reserves.  The remaining had to go into the Council’s accumulated deficit which would be £5.7m by the end of March 2021.

Councillor Gunn confirmed she had therefore called for a planned National Review of SEND funding as it needed to be addressed for the sake of all of the children and young people who had special educational needs and disabilities, and also their families who were feeling the pressure of having to fight to get what they believed was the right approach to education for their children.

The Chair encouraged Partners to write to the Secretary of State for Education on behalf of their own organisations if further weight could be added in terms of lobbying.

Resolved:

a)    That the progress made in partnership across County Durham since the original SEND Inspection and WSOA was put in place be noted.

b)    That the update provided in relation to the SEND revisit, the published outcome letter and the work outlined on next steps being done with partners through the SEND Partnership be noted.