Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether his Department has undertaken any consultation with the Communication Trust and its delivery partners on his plans to discontinue funding for specialist speech, language and communication support; and whether he will release the findings of any such consultation.

The Department for Education’s current one-year contract with I CAN, on behalf of The Communication Trust (TCT) is due to end, as planned, at the end of March 2018. We were clear with TCT at the beginning of the 2017-18 contract that the contract was for one year only.

Over the last year, we have been working with TCT on the sustainability of their work beyond the contract period. We are also discussing with TCT how we will best ensure that all practitioners are able to make continued use of the wealth of materials, resources and training developed through this contract.