Agenda item

The Committee considered a report of the Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services that provided members with a progress update on Children and Young People with Special Education Needs and Disabilities (SEND) in County Durham specifically the trends in requests for Education, Health and Care (EHCP) needs assessments, EHCP timeliness performance, identified needs of young people and where young people with SEND are educated in County Durham. Members were also provided with an update on national policy consultation (for copy of report, see file of minutes).

The Strategic Manager SEND, and Inclusion Strategy Assessment and Provision was in attendance to present the report and deliver a presentation (for copy of presentation, see file of minutes).

The presentation provided members with details of key findings; number of children receiving SEN support and Educational Health and Care Plans; the number of Educational Health and Care Plan requests; details of the number of Educational Health and Care Plans refusals; the number of Educational Health Care Plans completed within 20 weeks; primary need of young people with Educational Health Care Plans; Autism analysis; active Educational Health Care Plans placements; details of the SEND Green Paper and the Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission proposed SEND inspection framework.

Members were advised that that there had been a change in the way that EHCPs had been recognised in the age phases so in 2014 they moved to a 0-25 system that was previously 0-19, the Officer commented that the authority had a lot of young people in the older age phase.

The Strategic Manager SEND and Inclusion advised that there was a 60% increase in EHCP requests which was held back during the COVID pandemic but had now picked up again with a lot more requests driving SEND needs. At a younger age children’s SEND needs are managed in school, but the number of requests increase at a primary school level and reduce at secondary level because there were plans already in place.

Members received information about the EHCP assessment refusals which was when an assessment was refused due to lack of information, usually from schools. The basis of decision to refuse was that it was felt that schools had not done enough to support young people in school through SEN Support. Information indicated that the EHCP assessment refusals were higher in County Durham than both regionally and nationally. However, when Durham was challenged on refusals, they found that the refusal was repealed therefore changes were made to the decision-making process to address this. The Strategic Manager advised that young people’s SEND needs could be met through SEN Support and the service was promoting early working with SEN Co-ordinators (SENCOs) and that EHCPs should only be when a full multi agency assessment was required.

The Strategic Manager advised that 2022 had been another challenging year in relation to the number of assessments required. There was an issue with a lack of Educational Psychologist which was a national issue too and the problem in County Durham was not as big as in other areas. The majority of EHCP assessments were undertaken by 20 weeks and all were complete by 23 weeks but there was still pressure on the team.

Members were then given information on the primary needs of young people with EHCPs which indicates autism as the primary need for young people in County Durham which was higher than what was reported regionally and nationally. However, it was stressed that although autism may be a young person’s predominant need it may not be their only need and would encourage that young people are not seen only in terms of their primary need.

The Strategic Manger advised that previously there were higher percentages of other needs but due to a higher level of awareness of autism they had now become secondary. He went on to advise that Durham County Council had an Autism Strategy and there was lots of training with regard to autism taking place and suggested that previously autism may have been an unrecognised need.

Members were advised that there were more children with EHCPs of secondary age group attending special schools than of primary age group. Information was provided in relation to enhanced learning provision working with local authorities and special schools and that there were funding improvements, where local authorities were given money upfront, and they were making headway. It was better if the young person stayed in their mainstream school as they would stay with their friends and peers and stay in the local community where they can flourish and thrive.

Members were given an update on the SEND Green Paper and advised that the service had responded to the consultation through engagement with service users and key stakeholders including members and was now being analysed by the Department for Education (DfE). The Strategic Manager advised that a new inspection framework was being built around the Green Paper but the anomaly in the fact that it was a Green Paper and not a White Paper, but the service welcomed the thematic work with Ofsted.

The Chair thanked the Officer for his presentation and asked members for their questions.

Councillor Hunt referred to the rise in EHCPs in mainstream schools and asked if that was due to there not been enough provision for special schools, which was a concern if this was the case.

The Strategic Manager responded that there had been a rise in the number of needs assessment requests. He stated that 98% of those assessments ended up with an EHCP but were still in mainstream schools as an EHCP did not mean that you went to a special school, their needs were assessed, and they determined what provision the young person required. He commented that a number of parents preferred to see their child go to a special school and the service did try to work with that. However, the service aimed to keep as many children as possible in their mainstream school for a number of benefits. There was a high demand for SEND school places that was higher than the national and regional average and in some year groups in these schools there were no more spaces available. There were some high needs young people in special schools, but there were other young people who were managing in mainstream schools and their parents wanted them to remain there. The service were trying to create more provision in SEN schools with an extra 90 places and the potential for a further 200 in the future.

Councillor Hunt responded that in her ward there were some children who had attended a SEN primary school but could not obtain a place in a SEN secondary school, as there was insufficient provision.

The Strategic Manager indicated that he was not aware of any pupils who had transitioned from a SEN primary school to a mainstream secondary school, but he would look into this. Councillor Hunt responded that she would provide the Officer with the details.

Councillor Walton sought reassurance on the assessment refusals for EHCPs as many of them were overturned which was alarming especially from a parent’s point of view having to keep going through the assessment. She noted that the figures for these refusals were now decreasing but wanted a reassurance that the process was robust.

The Strategic Manager responded that he was happy to talk through the assessment process which was via a multi-agency panel that looked at the applications and was consistent with national figures and there was no involvement of case workers at this point. He commented that more could be done in schools in terms of SENCO assessment, and they would expect this to be done first with top-up funding and other resources but recognised that there were pressures on parents.

Mrs Gunn suggested that most special schools in the North East were predominantly Social, Emotion and Mental Health (SEMH) with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) bolted on however these are two very different cohorts of young people whose needs were very different and do not work well together and suggested that this should be addressed and asked if there were schools for autistic young people. She added that the closest independent school for high functioning autistic pupils was in Thirsk and only catered for boys. To consider the opportunities of the SEND Green Paper review to direct independents to become more specialised in their provision across the North East.

She then asked the Officer to be aware of change management processes if further changes are required from the SEN review and the impact on the team and if more needed to be implemented.

The Strategic Manager responded that in County Durham they had the Elemore Hall, the Meadows and Walworth special mental health schools with other generic special schools which would support a range of different needs. Some young people attended these schools as recognised SEMH need as their primary need, but then other needs were identified. It was dependant on the young person’s primary need and their behaviour could be an unrecognised need. In the Northeast SEMH schools as a proportion of SEND placements was 19/20% with the rest of the country at around 15%. He stated that he was working with a regional network to understand this and look at the SEMH schools and provision and look at the cohorts in these schools. They would only ever place a young person in a SEMH school if this was recognised as the primary need, there were some provisions where young people were also Autistic, but the primary need was SEMH. Special schools had carried out a lot of work on their Autism offer and there was a lot more discreet Autism in generic special schools where classrooms had all autistic pupils with different sensory needs. The service also worked with the independent sector, and with the North East Autism Society that operated in County Durham, but they didn’t want to rely on the independent sector for their main offer. In terms of the service’s awareness regarding change management, they were set up for this and used to change. The SEN casework team had grown to recognise the importance of being involved in the annual review process and not just the assessments and they were involved in key transition points.

Mrs Gunn indicated that in her experience a lot of SEMH schools did not offer GCSE qualifications. She then referred to the legal process and if a school can’t meet a child’s need legally, they have to say why to be inclusive but what she had discovered was that if they can meet the needs there is no legal obligation to say how they can meet the needs and therefore don’t have the same protection for a child and gave an example of her experience and asked if they could protect the child. She then referred to managing the contract and when places don’t work out and a child had to move provision, the local authority was contracted to pay the school for that placement and hoped it was not a lot of funds and provided details of her own experience.

The Strategic Manager responded in terms of high functioning orders in the County if a young person was high functioning with autism the best offer was to adapt a mainstream environment where they had high level teaching and high-level offer and encouraged Mrs Gunn to look at the enhanced learning provision that they had on offer and provided some examples of different things they could offer. In terms of the legal challenge the authority had no control over this, the power was with the parents and if their preference was for their child to go to a mainstream school the law was on their side.

Councillor Coult referred to how the council worked with SENCO leads and how they ensured that the SENCO leads in schools had the skills and knowledge to run the process from start to finish which was a stressful process. She then referred to her own experience and how the Council did not recognise a condition of a family member and how it was deemed by the local authority that the person did not have special needs and that they had to go back to the medical professionals to justify the family member’s special needs.

The Strategic Manager indicated that terminology was difficult, and he was unable to comment on individual cases. In terms of SENCO support there was pressure in schools and SENCO required time. The SENCO staff had a lot of experience and were well placed to do the job effectively, but this needed to be prioritised within the school, but this was down to school governance and leadership. The service could offer support, and they delivered the national SENCO qualification on a termly basis and ran networks and had almost complete attendance at these networks.

Councillor Andrews asked if there was any comparative data between private and state schools for SEND pupils including Autism.

The Strategic Manager indicated that there was not any specific data, but they did have people with special education needs going to private schools. They had looked at SEN across deprivation and they found that SEN did not follow deprivation. There were some trends that showed social, emotional and mental health was higher in deprived communities and Autism was higher in non-deprived communities, but the trend was not massive.

Councillor Hunt asked if they had any data on EHCP areas and SEND to ascertain if certain areas had more need and look to having more provision in these areas.

The Strategic Manager responded that SEN followed the population areas and was where they had the special schools in the higher population areas. He stated that transport was an issue, more local provision would be the long-term solution, but the service was looking at some short-term solutions to address this which was outside of the schools budget as it was a council budget. He advised there was a going review of Home to School transport.

Councillor Hunt referred to the waiting lists and asked if any areas had longer waiting lists.

The Strategic Manager indicated that they did not have waiting lists there were needs assessments ongoing but there were no trends. The 20-week process was the closest thing to a waiting list, sometimes they had higher demand for a particular school. Young people would remain in their current provision until other provision became available. The biggest issue was transport when they had a place at specialist provision at the other end of the county and passed several mainstream schools which could have made adaptations to meet a young person’s needs was the biggest challenge.

Resolved: (i) That the report and presentation be noted.

(ii) That the Children and Young People Overview and Scrutiny Committee continue to receive further progress updates on young people with SEND and EHCPs.