Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of introducing school-based whole family support practitioners to support the SEND system.

This government wants to create a high-quality system that places children and families at the centre of its design, providing meaningful and consistent support for families as their needs change over time.

Schools, colleges, early years and childcare settings, and other educational providers, including alternative provision, all have a pivotal role to play in safeguarding children and promoting their welfare. Their insight and co-operation are vital to the successful delivery of multi-agency safeguarding arrangements. People working in education settings play an important role in building relationships, identifying concerns and providing direct support to children.

The Children’s Social Care National Framework sets out the purpose, principles and enablers of good practice and the outcomes that should be achieved. The guidance describes what everyone working with families should do and helps everyone come together with a clear vision for how to transform the support that families receive.

Services should prioritise supporting the whole family, recognising that problems do not exist in silos and are often interconnected and intergenerational. Intervening to provide support at the earliest opportunity can help prevent challenges from escalating and improve outcomes.

Family hubs play an important role helping families access vital services to improve the health, education and wellbeing of children, young people and their families. As part of the family hubs’ ‘Start for Life’ programme, there are now over 400 family hubs open across 88 local authorities, creating a welcoming place where families with children aged 0 to 19, or up to 25 with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), can be connected to a wide range of services.

Programme guidance outlines the minimum expectation that local authorities should be delivering in their family hubs for SEND support Family Hub Service Expectations.

This support includes the staff in the family hub being knowledgeable about the SEND services available and being able to connect families to SEND services within the family hub network.

Over the last three years, many of the local authorities on the programme have chosen to focus on improving SEND services, bringing local offers together in one place and funding early identification/intervention on speech, language and communication needs.