Disabled Children: Support Services

Lord Addington Excerpts

Thursday 23rd June 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My noble friend rightly points to the gap in outcomes for children with special educational needs and disabilities. He will be aware of the proposals we set out in the schools White Paper, with the aim that 90% of children should leave primary school with the required standard in reading, writing and maths. That can happen only if children with special educational needs see much better outcomes. That is behind the commitment that we set out in the Green Paper, but also the financial commitments we have made in terms of capital and revenue for those children.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

Does the Minister agree—I think she has—that the current system is overly legally confrontational and has primarily benefited lawyers? Having said that, what is the Minister going to do to make sure that those with low frequency problems or high needs—by definition there are few places that can support them—can travel in the new regime or have their needs met by people coming to them? That is a real problem for a very few and one that the Government must deal with if they are to get this right.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I absolutely agree that the system is overly confrontational. I cannot comment on the benefits to lawyers, being surrounded by so many of them. Parents tell us that it is overly confrontational. The noble Lord makes a good point. It will be important, and I invite the noble Lord to hold us to account on how we address those issues when we report back on the Green Paper.