Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the effect on the level of support for (1) disabled children, and (2) families, of the proposed policy change in the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) review to decide the services disabled young people receive on the basis of a new national banding system.

The Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Green Paper sets out the department’s proposals to improve the outcomes and experiences of children and young people with SEND and their families, so that they can fulfil their potential and lead happy, healthy, and productive adult lives. The proposals aim to drive national consistency in how needs are assessed, identified, and met across education, health, and care, through the introduction of national standards.

The department wants to ensure the most effective use of the investment in high needs funding and the proposal for a national framework of funding bands is to allow far greater consistency in funding arrangements throughout the system. We are consulting on how best to develop a national framework for funding bands and tariffs, to make it easier for children and young people, and their families, to understand not only the provision they can access locally, but also the funding levels that provision would attract, giving them greater assurance that their child’s needs will be met appropriately.