Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment she has made of the adequacy of the provision of services for children with special educational needs and disabilities in (a) South Holland and the Deepings constituency and (b) Lincolnshire.

A joint local area special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) inspection of Lincolnshire was undertaken by Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission in October 2018. At the time, inspectors identified no significant areas of weakness in SEND services. The inspection covered all of Lincolnshire including South Holland and the Deepings constituency.

Ofsted launched a new framework for area SEND inspections in January 2023. This framework introduced a continuous cycle of inspections, where each local area will have at least one full area SEND inspection within five years of the launch of the framework. Lincolnshire will be inspected under this framework in due course.