Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of rural and coastal local authorities’ capacity to deliver Experts at Hand services.

The department is investing around £1.8 billion over the next three years in Experts at Hand to improve mainstream settings’ access to specialist education and health expertise, including in rural and coastal communities.

The offer is being developed locally, so that areas can make the best use of available specialist capacity and tailor support to local geography and need. This may include specialists supporting groups of settings through training and advice, with supervised trainees, assistants and support workers helping to extend capacity and reach. We are working closely with colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care to ensure that there are no cold spots and that every single mainstream setting has access to essential support.

Alongside this we will continue to support nationally to build specialist capacity needed for delivery, by investing over £40 million in the specialist workforce. Of this funding, £26 million will go towards training at least 200 educational psychologists per year in 2026/27. This will be followed by further investment to train more from 2028, subject to future spending review decisions. The remaining £15 million will be invested to establish new speech and language therapist advanced practitioners in every integrated care board geographical area, to get more speech and language therapists working in education settings.