Access to Sport: PE in Schools

Max Wilkinson Excerpts

Thursday 3rd April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Leigh Ingham]

I completely agree. I am about to say a little bit about that, because equitable access to sports is so important. Before I was elected as an MP, I worked for an organisation called Plan International, which specialises in working with young people, particularly young women and girls. I was shocked to learn that, on average, two thirds of playgrounds are taken up by boys. They often play football, which means that the physical space that girls have for playing sport is significantly diminished.

I was delighted to learn that four schools in my constituency signed up to take part in a girls’ “biggest ever football session”: Sir Graham Balfour, Flash Ley primary, Stafford Manor high and Church Eaton primary. Change starts at home, so I am proud to have schools in my patch that prioritise the inclusion of young women and girls in sport and football. However, despite the Lionesses’ brilliant 2022 Euros win, many girls still do not feel comfortable playing football. In 2022, the Lionesses brought football home and said that it was only the beginning. I echo their open letter to the then Prime Minister, in which they asked him to make sure that young girls have access to at least two hours of PE a week, that physical activity among young women is tracked, and that there is accountability for ensuring that takes place. The Government now have the chance to deliver on the Lionesses’ ask, which would benefit girls and young women around the country.

From Sport England’s research, we know that active children are not only healthier but happier, more resilient and more confident. However, despite the overwhelming evidence supporting the benefits of physical activity, many young people are being left behind, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds. I spoke to representatives of Swim England, who told me that only 50% of children from the least affluent families can swim 25 metres by the time they leave primary school. By comparison, 90% of children from wealthy families can.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the impact of covid-19 on children’s relationship with physical activity has been profound. Those who were in nursery or early primary school when the pandemic struck, who are now in years 3 to 8, remain significantly less likely than their older peers to have positive attitudes towards sport and physical activity. Worryingly, happiness scores have also dropped among these age groups, as has their sense of resilience. The number of children who keep trying when things get tough is down by 6.9% for those in years 5 and 6, and down by 7% for those in years 8 and 9. In a changing world, we know how important it is that children are able to keep going when things get tough, and sport is one of the key ways that they can learn that resilience. As Tane said, where else can a child learn to pick themselves up and go again?

In preparing for this debate, I wanted to ensure that the voices of children with special educational needs and disabilities were at the heart of the discussion. Walton Hall academy in my constituency is a special educational needs school, and it has told me how crucial the role of sports is in supporting its students by providing an opportunity to develop essential skills, including hand-eye co-ordination and teamwork, while fostering a sense of belonging and confidence.

For many SEND young people in both mainstream and specialist schools, sport is not only an activity, but a powerful vehicle for achieving their education, health and care plan targets, such as promoting communication and building connections, which are areas that can be particularly challenging for SEND young people. However, when I spoke to the Activity Alliance and ParalympicsGB, both shared some worrying information about inclusivity of sports for SEND young people. Nationally, 15% of our young people and children have special educational needs, which is about 1.5 million people, but 75% of them are not active in school, meaning that over one in 10 of our children nationwide are not active. I fear that those numbers are due to a poor understanding of inclusion for disabled children.

Furthermore, accessing sport and play outside school can be financially prohibitive for SEND families, with membership fees and specialised equipment presenting specific barriers. I have been running a campaign in my own constituency for inclusive playparks as places where children can get active for free, but that would need to be rolled out nationwide. That has significant challenges because of the differences when it comes to special educational needs and disabilities. I recently hosted a coffee morning on SEND in my constituency, and many parents told me that their experience with councils and schools was frequently adversarial and confrontational, which can exacerbate this issue.

No child should be left on the sidelines, and I know how seriously the Department for Education takes its responsibility to SEND children. I strongly encourage the Government to consider adapting teacher training and education to ensure that the next generation of the teaching workforce have the skills and confidence necessary to deliver truly inclusive physical education. That could involve significant disability inclusion training, and introducing subject-specific disability inclusion training to the core content framework for PE specialists, such as special accessible lesson plans and a wide range of adaptive sport. I do not know if any Members have ever played wheelchair basketball, but it is actually the most fun, and it is incredibly competitive.

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

I recently played wheelchair basketball with the Harrogate Hammerheads, at the Liberal Democrat party conference, with my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Ed Davey). It was a joyful experience, and what I learned is that it is basically impossible.

[Leigh Ingham]

I thank the hon. Member for the intervention. I agree that it is definitely a challenge, but what I like about it is that it can provide a level playing field. A class of mainstream and SEND kids can play it together, and everyone finds it really challenging, so it is a great leveller.

Moving on from SEND, the ongoing curriculum review is a rare opportunity to enhance access to PE. Sport teaches teamwork, discipline and resilience, which are essential qualities for both education and employment. Employers seek individuals who can collaborate and persevere, and sport provides such a training ground. A diverse PE curriculum, including activities beyond traditional sports such as football and rugby—no shame; they are both great sports—can engage more students. Options such as martial arts, yoga and dance could be explored to ensure that PE appeals to all.

However, this is not just about access to sport; it is about the social value of sport, and the fact that it gives children and young people more time and energy to focus on other subjects and attain better results. What other subject gives kids focus like PE does? By embedding structured, high-quality PE into the school week, we would be not only improving children’s health, but giving them the tools they need to succeed in other subjects and studies. Sport also provides valuable lessons beyond the classroom, such as teamwork, resilience, discipline and leadership. Again, those are essential qualities for most careers.

I make it clear that, perhaps unusually, this debate is not to ask for more money for sports, at a time when our financial situation is so tenuous. What we need are more sustainable funding frameworks for PE, and for the pupil premium and school games organisers. In 2016, school games organisers received a funding promise for each academic year of that Parliament. That was during a process of substantial change under previous Governments, Prime Ministers and Education Secretaries, but that funding commitment did give schools the ability to plan ahead, build structured sports programmes, and invest in the staff and resources necessary to make PE effective. However, in the years since, uncertainty over future funding has left many schools unable to make long-term commitments, forcing them into a cycle of short-term solutions that do not serve students or school communities well.

We need assurances that funding for sport and PE will be protected and given the same security as other areas of education. Without that, we risk losing dedicated school games organisers and vital school sports programmes that have been proven to improve health and wellbeing. Can the Minister please give confirmation that funding for school games organisers will be provided for the next year, and consider the possibility of more sustainable long-term funding commitments?

In conclusion, we know that sport provides a health value in improving physical health. We also know that it provides a social value, in the wellbeing of our children and adults. Finally, we know that it provides an economic value, in reducing mental health service usage, fewer GP visits and preventing illness. Altogether, that value is upwards of £100 billion each year. Sport and PE are not just about fitness; they are about the future. They are about creating a society where young people grow up healthier, happier and more equipped to navigate life’s challenges. The benefits of sport are not abstract. They are real, measurable and profoundly impactful. If we want a healthier nation, a more resilient workforce and a stronger society, then investing in access to sport and PE is not just a policy choice—it is a necessity.

I urge the Government to take the issue seriously, to commit to sustainable funding and to ensure that every child, regardless of background, has the opportunity to thrive through sport. We must listen to young people like Tane, who have articulated so clearly the need for action. We must respond with real change. As Tane said when he wrote to me:

“This seems like quite a simple solution to a lot of problems.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker—you would always be my first pick. [Interruption.] Sorry, that was a terrible start, wasn’t it? Let me do better. Otherwise, my jokes will end up going down like the US stock market.

The hon. Member for Cannock Chase (Josh Newbury) mentioned rounders, and the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Dan Aldridge) mentioned the school that I went to. That took me right back to my GCSE PE assessment, where we were told that we would do rounders because it was the easiest and we would get good grades as a result. I regret to inform the House that I got a three out of seven for rounders. I have no idea how, and that led to my failing to get a C grade at GCSE PE. [Hon. Members: “Aw!”] I know, and I became the Liberal Democrat Culture, Media and Sport spokesperson despite that failure—not that a D grade is a failure.

I will get serious now. We are in the midst of a crisis of sedentary lifestyles and obesity. Almost a third of children and young people are classed as inactive. More than one in four children is either overweight or obese, and the mental health crisis among young people is widely acknowledged to be totally out of control, not least because of the subject of the previous debate on social media. These facts shame our nation and store up huge problems for our economy, our health services and individuals. That is why the debate is timely, and I commend the hon. Member for Stafford—and the villages—for securing time in the Chamber, because instilling a love of sport and exercise in young people can do so much to turn around and tackle the public health crisis, and that starts in school.

For me and for many of us, my earliest memories of taking part in sport are of playing football on the primary school playground, but I know from first-hand experience what happens when schools do not have the facilities to offer proper PE lessons. When I attended Broadoak school in the constituency of the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare, it was falling down, and we had one playing field left for the whole time we were there. We were all crammed on to it at break time. That meant we were not able to play as many fixtures as we otherwise might have done. I was too weedy for rugby, and the guy who was captaining the football team just picked his mates and did not like me, so it made little difference to my school experience, but it did have an impact on many others. It probably had an impact on what else went on at the school, which struggled with a difficult catchment area. Although I rarely took to the field for my school teams, I did achieve something brilliant in the fourth division of the Cardiff University intramural games: I scored from the halfway line against the Japanese society—a moment I will never forget, nor will anyone else who was on the pitch that day.

On a more serious note, 42,000 hours of physical education have been lost from the curriculum in the last decade. That is a travesty. State secondary schools in England taught 284,000 hours of PE in 2021, down 13% from 2011. I have many high-performing independent schools in my constituency and many good state schools, but the difference in provision between the independent and state sectors is marked. We need to ensure that the state sector is providing the very best for children.

The proportion of pupils in years 7 and 8 who can swim the standard 25 metres has fallen in the last eight years, with disparities evident among demographic groups, giving rise to concerns about equality. That is not surprising, because 217 school pools have been lost over the last 15 years. Swim England says that the Department for Education cannot even provide statistics due to the number of schools not properly reporting swimming lessons.

Sport England suggests putting PE at the heart of the curriculum by protecting time for it and subjecting it to suitable rigour. It suggests a really important change from traditional school approaches—that we reimagine the PE curriculum, so that it is based on enjoyment and meaning, rather than forcing people to go into a scrum and run into each other on the pitch. That is wise, because not everyone is into that kind of sport; they might be into yoga, dance or something else. Let us be expansive about this. Enjoyment is the single biggest factor that drives up the number of minutes that children spend playing sport.

The Lawn Tennis Association is among the bodies calling for us to enact the chief medical officer’s recommendation for one hour of sport and physical activity to be delivered inside and outside school every single day. To do its bit, the LTA is offering free teacher training and a grant for equipment. It is also asking for clarity about the future funding of the park tennis project, and I hope the Minister can provide that clarity or take the matter up with her colleagues.

The medical experts and sports organisations know what is screamingly obvious to everyone else: sport and physical activity is the silver bullet for solving our public health crisis. If we can get it right by instilling healthy habits among people at an early age, and then providing them with opportunities through their life, much of the rest of the challenge we have in the NHS will fall into place. It is not fashionable to say that, because we are supposed to just stand up and shout, “Save the NHS!” but I think we in this place all know that it is much more complex than that.

Facilities are core to the challenge. In my constituency, I am supporting Pittville school’s efforts to upgrade its badly outdated sports hall. When the kids play badminton, the shuttlecock hits the ceiling. The school has been waiting for ages to get its application through the planning system. One of the local councils has, remarkably, raised an objection on conservation and heritage grounds. I hope Ministers agree that the planning system should be making it easier for schools to build more sports facilities, not getting in the way. I hope Ministers will also consider designating sports halls and swimming pools as critical health infrastructure. That is a really important idea for Ministers to take forward, because in these straitened times, it costs the taxpayer nothing to do that.

In February 2013—so long ago that I had a full head of hair—Ofsted published a report recommending that schools spend at least two hours a week on PE. All these years on, there is still no requirement for schools to provide those two hours. We want to ensure that every child has access to high-quality PE, as well as extracurricular sports activities. That would ensure that all children had access to some form of physical education, which is not always the case. We need to restore those two hours. Can the Minister confirm that the Government are considering that?

School also serves as an important gateway to sports clubs. The Sport and Recreation Alliance is calling for better links between schools and sports clubs—something the Liberal Democrats passed a policy on as long ago as 2004. Is that one simple change part of the Government’s agenda? We all know that the Government are dealing with tight finances, but it is important to note that every pound invested in sport is likely to generate a return on our investment of more than £4. I cannot think of a better investment for this nation to make.

We in this place often talk about the pressures on the NHS, and about making a proper effort to ensure that children benefit from a love of sport and activity. If we can marry those two up, we will ensure that many children who are growing up to be obese, unhealthy, and depressed are saved from that fate. If we fail to get this right, Members from across the Chamber can carry on saying “save the NHS” and complaining about waiting times as much as we like, but it will not make a difference. All we will ever be doing is dealing with an epidemic of chronic physical inactivity, and mental illnesses caused by inactivity. We will be denying generations to come a love of sport and physical activity, which would be a dereliction of duty on the part of us all.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the shadow Minister.

Apprenticeships

Max Wilkinson Excerpts

Tuesday 4th February 2025 Westminster Hall

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Jardine. I congratulate the hon. Member for Peterborough (Andrew Pakes) on securing the debate.

Apprenticeships are a vital part of our education system, and the Liberal Democrats think there should be more of them. They break down barriers to opportunity and offer young people a chance to learn while earning through vocational placements. However, after years of Conservative failure, the system is badly struggling and is failing to attract the number of young people it should.

[Mr Perkins]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for saying that the Liberal Democrats believe that there should be more apprenticeships. One of his colleagues said that the apprenticeship levy should be abolished. Can he clarify whether that is Liberal Democrat policy? If so, how does he intend to fund the extra apprenticeships that he wants?

[Max Wilkinson]

I will move on to that, and the hon. Gentleman will find that there is a pleasing consensus between my party and his.

There are positive stories around, and I will highlight an example of good practice from Cheltenham. The hon. Member for Gloucester (Alex McIntyre) mentioned Gloscol, which has one of the most influential, if not the most influential, cyber-clusters outside London. The 5,000 members in CyNam work closely with academia and the education sector to build the skills that drive growth. Gloucestershire college is helping to equip the cyber-security professionals of tomorrow with the skills they need via a range of digital and cyber apprenticeships, in both Cheltenham and Gloucester. Apprentices at Gloscol benefit from being at the heart of Cheltenham’s cyber-security community, close to GCHQ and the Golden Valley development, alongside experienced professionals based in co-working spaces on site. The cyber degree apprenticeship is endorsed by the National Cyber Security Centre and is offered in partnership with the University of the West of England. It gives young people a route into a huge growth sector, helps our economy to thrive locally and nationally, and makes our nation safer too. The college is also offering courses at its new £5.2 million sustainable construction centre. The hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Terry Jermy) mentioned green skills earlier. We are equipping young people with the skills needed to deliver the built environment we need for the future.

Those are just two examples from Gloucestershire college, which is ably led by its visionary principal, Matthew Burgess. It is a local success story of which I and the hon. Member for Gloucester are rightly proud, and it shows that offering apprenticeships should be a much bigger priority for this country.

[Gideon Amos (Taunton and Wellington) (LD)]

Another key development site, similar to the projects my hon. Friend has mentioned, is Tata’s Agratas gigafactory near Taunton. It is important that colleges can set up apprenticeships and skills training in advance of the factory being built. Does my hon. Friend support a request to the Minister to facilitate that?

[Max Wilkinson]

Of course. An alignment of skills with the jobs need for the future is key in the apprenticeship sector. Flawed policy in the past means that there has been a clear drop-off in new apprentices in recent years. Just over 736,000 apprentices participated in an apprenticeship in the last academic year, which is a slight decrease of 2.1% on the previous reporting period. Apprenticeship starts overall have fallen by 170,000 since 2015-16, when the Conservatives started governing alone. The deal on offer is clearly not as attractive as it once was.

We need to recognise that apprentices have the same rights as other employees, but experience a large pay disparity compared with other workers. The national minimum wage will be £11.44 for those aged 21 and over, but for a first-year apprentice, the rate is much lower. Young people are not immune from the cost of living crisis and the disparity between those two wages might be a disincentive. Have Ministers considered whether it is and whether it might be putting young people off from taking up apprenticeships?

The Liberal Democrats would scrap the apprentice rate and instead pay apprentices more fairly. We must also reform the apprenticeship levy, which many Members have mentioned today. Employers tell us that it simply does not work and the House of Commons Library briefing shows that there are large underspends every single year. The amount of money being put aside to train young people is simply not being spent. The Association of Employment and Learning Providers says that the money is being raised for skills but not spent on skills, at a time when Governments—this one and the last—say they are keen to encourage businesses to invest in skills.

The Lib Dems would replace the broken apprenticeship levy with a broader and more flexible skills and training levy. We are pleased to hear that the Government want to abolish the apprenticeship levy and replace it with a new growth and skills levy under Skills England. That is a positive step. However, it is clear that there is still work to be done in establishing the new levy and Skills England to oversee it. I would appreciate an update from the Minister on where things are with that policy.

There is also a concern that careers advice systems are not being properly set up to advise people of the many opportunities in apprenticeships. If we are going to fill the skills gaps that we have discussed, alignment of careers advice with those gaps will be key.

We Liberal Democrats believe that apprenticeships have a much bigger role to play. We welcome the Government’s plan for changing the system. If we get the reform right, we will help young people and employers, too. Central to that will be finally getting rid of the failed apprenticeship levy, properly valuing apprenticeships and learning from best practice like that in my constituency and that of my neighbour in Gloucester.

[Christine Jardine (in the Chair)]

I call the Opposition spokesperson, Rebecca Paul.

Oral Answers to Questions

Max Wilkinson Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Janet Daby]

I recognise the vital role that sixth-form colleges play, including Luton sixth-form college, and I agree that high-quality staff are what helps to make them great, as well as our amazing students. That is why we announced an additional £300 million for further education in the Budget, and it is why we are releasing £50 million of that funding in this academic year, so that colleges can respond to priorities, including workforce recruitment and retention, and use those funds as they see fit.

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

Balcarras school in my constituency has calculated that if its funding for its sixth form had increased by just 2% over the past 15 years, it would now have more than £650,000 extra to keep its school running. The head warns me that the sector is now at breaking point. Do Ministers recognise what is going on in the sector after the years of underfunding we have had?

[Janet Daby]

I reiterate that the one-off £50 million grant will enable colleges to respond to current priorities and challenges as they see fit, including workforce recruitment and retention. It is up to those colleges and sixth forms to choose how to use that funding to best meet learners’ needs. I invite the hon. Member to write in if he would like some further information.

Oral Answers to Questions

Max Wilkinson Excerpts

Monday 9th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Catherine McKinnell]

My hon. Friend is a strong advocate for special educational needs in his community. We know that SENCOs perform a vital function in making sure that children and their families get the support they need to access the education they deserve. He is right that they deserve support as well. We need to encourage more people to be trained up in and understand the needs of children with special educational needs so that everybody can play their part in creating an inclusive education system.

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

Businesses report that cyber-attacks are increasing, as is the amount of time they have to wait to employ someone to deal with those cyber-attacks. What is the Department doing to fill that skills gap?

[Bridget Phillipson]

The hon. Member is right that there are skills gaps in cyber, digital and tech overall. That is why Skills England will drive forward our work in addressing those skills gaps as well as in ensuring that our young people have great careers in the years to come. That is one area in particular where I know there is lots of opportunity for young people to enjoy a fantastic career.

Higher Education: Financial Sustainability

Max Wilkinson Excerpts

Thursday 5th December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Vaz. I congratulate the hon. Member for Erewash (Adam Thompson) on securing this important debate. University funding is undoubtedly in crisis. We have heard mentions of universities around the country, and there is a very similar story at mine, which I will tell later.

The previous Government broke the sector’s finances. That left the country with a system that is unfair to students, while pushing many institutions to the brink. We should not forget, in among that, the lecturers who work so hard in our universities too, as well as all the support staff. On the other side, we have students who increasingly feel burdened by the cost of living crisis and the long-term repayment of loans. When I speak to students today in my constituency of Cheltenham, it is a very different picture from the one that existed when I went to university in the early noughties in terms of how much they pay for rent, food and energy bills.

The previous Government made the tuition fee system unfair. The Liberal Democrats, however, cannot support simply raising fees at this stage without substantial reforms. At this stage, the right thing to do would be to undertake a full review of finance in the sector to consider ways to improve access to, and participation in, degrees, as well as the quality of courses, because value for money for students remains extremely important.

While the sector is struggling, we must absolutely not lose sight of the key challenge—removing barriers to entry for new students. That is why the Liberal Democrats believe that the reintroduction of maintenance grants is a vital first step, and I was heartened to hear the hon. Member for Erewash raise that in his opening remarks. Maintenance grants were scrapped by the Conservatives in 2016, which makes it so much harder for young people from less well-off backgrounds even to get to university in the first place. It is regrettable that the new Government are not yet committing to the full restoration of maintenance grants, and we urge Ministers to consider them as a way of bringing fairness back into the system. Scrapping maintenance grants was not the only way in which the Conservatives made the system less fair for students, lecturers, universities and everyone else. They stretched the repayment period so far into the future that some of today’s students will be paying back their loans until 2066. They also lowered the repayment threshold, leaving students paying back an extra £206 a year.

The earlier mentions of foreign students by the hon. Members for Erewash and for Luton South and South Bedfordshire (Rachel Hopkins) were pertinent, and I will now move on to that issue. The combination of the visa crackdowns and the rhetoric about foreign-born students placed further stress on the sector. The upshot is that the Office for Students suggests that about 40% of universities are likely to run a deficit this year. Locally, the University of Gloucestershire—based in my constituency and those of the hon. Member for Gloucester (Alex McIntyre) and my hon. Friend the Member for Tewkesbury (Cameron Thomas)—tells me that, of a turnover of £85 million, £65 million is from tuition fees, and around £20 million of that is from foreign students, but this year it has reductions in foreign students for both the January and autumn intakes. As I said, this is not just about the visa issue; it is also about rhetoric. The university tells me that its agents who recruit students from abroad say that the feedback from those students is that they are perhaps not quite so wanted in the UK as they once were, so they are selecting degree courses in Australia, America, Canada—elsewhere, where they feel more welcome.

The result is a £4 million hit to the University of Gloucestershire’s tuition fee revenue. That is significant. As a result, the university is closing some courses and consolidating others, reducing student choice. Some courses combining multiple humanities are the first to close; fashion is likely to go as well. That said, the university is doing what the Liberal Democrats have suggested too—cutting non-teaching costs and innovating.

The university is also taking advantage of Cheltenham’s cyber-security future. It recently opened a new £5.8 million cyber and digital centre, which will help cement Cheltenham’s position as the cyber capital of the UK. That places the university in the same sphere as CyNam, the local industry group, and alongside high-performing small and medium-sized enterprises that drive the local economy.

That kind of innovation has to be at the centre of what universities do in the future. However, the university warns that the benefit of the £300 tuition fee increase the Government offered this year is likely to be wiped out by the changes to national insurance for employers. I would like the Minister to respond to that point later.

The challenge for the new Government is to put things right, change the rhetoric and reinstate as much fairness in the system as they possibly can. We know that that is not going to be easy—we have all had challenges in the past, haven’t we?—but the Liberal Democrats cannot support an increase in fees at this stage. Reports now suggest that fees are to break the £10,000 barrier fairly soon and rise to £10,500 over the next five years. Before we could support that, more work is needed to undo the failures of the previous Government and restore fairness to the system.

SEND Provision

Max Wilkinson Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2024 Westminster Hall

[Munira Wilson]

I thank the hon. Member for her intervention and I agree that, where possible, we need to be as inclusive as possible. Equally, there are children whose needs cannot be met in a mainstream setting and we need to have special provision for them—I will touch on that in a moment.

The funding for special needs has fallen so far short of what is needed that local authorities across the country now have a cumulative high needs deficit of approximately £3.15 billion. Many local authorities’ financial viability is being put at risk by these growing deficits. Although the safety valve programme that my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Claire Young) mentioned, of which my own borough of Richmond upon Thames was an early member, has provided some relief, it is a sticking-plaster solution, kicking the can down the road. Once the agreements run out, those local authorities are projected to start racking up big deficits again.

As well as the cost of providing the support to which children are legally and morally entitled, councils are also seeing their SEND transport bills skyrocket. As my hon. Friend the Member for Harpenden and Berkhamsted (Victoria Collins) pointed out in the case from her constituency, we know that the number of children having to make long journeys has increased by almost a quarter over the past five years. Vulnerable children are having to travel ever further distances because specialist provision is not available locally for many.

Two thirds of all special schools are full or over capacity. The last Government was incredibly slow in building the special schools that they promised, and they turned down many applications from councils to build and open their own SEND schools to make that provision available. Councils face a double whammy: not only are they paying transportation costs, but they are having to buy in private provision.

Many independent SEND schools are brilliant not-for-profit charities, but there is also obscene profiteering from some special schools run by private equity firms, which are bleeding councils up and down the country dry. I hope the Labour Government will look at that because my calls to the Conservative Government fell on deaf ears.

I want to pick up a point made by the right hon. Member for Tatton (Esther McVey) about the many families whose children are not eligible for EHCPs or who cannot face the gauntlet of trying to secure one. They turn to mainstream, small independent schools to better support their child because larger mainstream schools cannot support that need, but those families will be penalised by the new Government’s plan to slap VAT on independent school fees from January. Those who will not be able to afford the additional cost will turn to the state sector, putting more pressure on, as we have heard, a system in crisis.

Furthermore, the proposal to have a VAT exemption for those with EHCPs will incentivise even more parents to apply through the system. I have heard from a constituent just this week who will probably have to do that, which will put yet more pressure on a system that cannot cope with more. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say about the 100,000 children who have SEND and are in the independent sector.

All of us recognise that SEND provision is an enormous challenge that will not be resolved overnight despite what the Secretary of State hopes to be able to do. I stand ready to support her in any way I can to make sure that we tackle the issue. The recent Liberal Democrat manifesto set out several ideas that I hope the Minister will look at.

First we propose that a new national body be established for SEND that would be responsible for funding the support of children with very high needs. The national body for SEND would pay for any costs above £25,000 for children with high needs. It would reduce risk for local authorities and help to tackle the postcode lottery that we have heard about.

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

Will my hon. Friend give way on that point?

[Munira Wilson]

I am not sure I have the time; I am so sorry. The national body for SEND would also act as a champion for every child with special needs or disabilities and promote widespread inclusive practice. Additionally, Liberal Democrats would like to see councils funded to reduce the amount that schools pay towards the cost of a child’s education, health and care plan. The current £6,000 threshold acts as a disincentive in the system, which can hinder schools from identifying and establishing a need before it impacts the child’s schooling. We cannot wait for things to go wrong before we fix them.

As the hon. Member for Gosport (Dame Caroline Dinenage) said, early intervention is key. That is why, as we have heard from many Labour Members, boosting training for teachers and for early years practitioners, so that we can identify needs early and support early, is so crucial.

Behind every statistic and case study we have heard about today, there is a child who is struggling, with parents and carers who are under stress. We have a duty to act. Liberal Democrats believe that every child, no matter their needs and background, deserves the opportunity to thrive. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s comments and to working with the Education Secretary to fix our broken SEND system. The children deserve it.