SEND Provision: Local Authorities

Rachel Gilmour Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd March 2026 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for School Standards (Georgia Gould)]

I thank the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley (Chris Coghlan) for his powerful and sobering speech, and for securing the debate. He and I have talked before about his research, which is heartbreaking and demonstrates powerfully the need for change. We have arranged a date for me to visit and speak to some of the families he is working with, and I am happy to make time after the debate to talk with the families who are here today. This is just unimaginable loss.

The hon. Member set out that he has gathered 200 stories, but I understand that there are thousands more stories in which children and families have been failed. I have travelled around the country to talk to families, and I have also heard so many stories.

[Rachel Gilmour (Tiverton and Minehead) (LD)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Dorking and Horley (Chris Coghlan) for his truly emotional and very caring speech. While the Minister is travelling around the country, will she spend some time in west Somerset, where 2,500 children are on the crisis list?

[Georgia Gould]

I thank the hon. Member for inviting me to speak to families in her area.

The conversations that I have had have so often been about parents battling for years to get the support that they know their children need, as the hon. Member for Dorking and Horley said, and about the powerlessness they feel as they watch their children struggle and fall behind.