SEND - children’s needs to be reassessed from year 6 2029?

It is all sickening. I've begged my council to assess, they have refused. It's over 5 years since I applied for the ehcp, no assessments were even made at the assessment stage. The ehcp was granted through tribunal, however the ehcp has NEVER been implemented by any school nor the la.
That's 5 years of no education, no provision no assessments.
I'm exhausted by the failures, you go to multiple tribunals, but anything they order doesn't get put in place, you complain to the tribunal, but they reply that they can't enforce their own rulings! You go to judicial review, but the la say "they are doing their best" so the judicial review gets closed! You write to your mp, the head of education etc etc, but they don't bother to respond. You make numerous complaints, you head to the ico, nothing gets done. It's a constant battle and fight, and you just get nowhere. They've stollen my motherhood and my child's childhood, and future. It is all scandalous, it will come out one day but I will probably have had a heart attack by then

You can’t discuss the expense without discussing the rise in numbers and the reasons for it.

With respect, a lot of parents are far too close to the situation to be able to step back and see the bigger picture. Everyone swears their child is very complex and in need of very expensive support and high level intervention, and that they’ll unalive themselves if they don’t (like with transgender) - thankfully suicide rates in young people are far lower now than the 1980s, so despite this apparent ‘mental health crisis’, thankfully it hasn’t actually resulted in that final worst case scenario.

All this endless introspection and complicated terminology for little understood conditions which are very nebulous and have basically exploded in the last 10 years alone is doing little good it seems. Teens and children had better outcomes before the advent of ‘neurodiversity’, and while this is probably also down to life now being more pressured, I honestly think this world of online information bombarding everyone with the idea that they’re different and disabled is not helping.

I acknowledge this is all controversial but we need to go back to basics. No bloody tablets for under 12s, dragging parents off their phones so they have to interact with their kids. Doing away with helicopter parenting which is making children anxious. Proper socialisation and firm but kind boundaries. Not hitting the panic button and phoning CAMHS every time their child is very unhappy.

It's nothing about 'worthiness' otherwise you're saying the vast majority of children (who get no specialist support) are 'unworthy'!!! There will be millions of children right now who struggle like your son but perhaps not quite as much, so don't quite meet the threshold for additional support - are they 'unworthy'?? Of course not, that's just using emotive language to try and stir things up.

There just has to be a threshold, a line drawn to determine a point where a child's needs are great enough that they qualify for extra support.

No matter where you draw the line, there will be children who closely miss out on extra support, who would nonetheless have benefitted from it.

The question is where do you draw the line. Where is the threshold. Sadly this comes down to money - you draw the line at the point where you can afford to pay for the support for all the children qualifying.

Right now, the line has been drawn such that more children are qualifying for support than we can afford to pay for, so unfortunately it has to be repositioned.

It's unfair that some children are disabled. Life is unfair, isn't it?

You’re not.

You’re talking about who you think is disabled or isn’t (nobody asked, btw) whether parents actually just need boundaries, and whether people with invisible disabilities should just get a job.

You are having a conversation about your views on disability, cloaked by “isn’t it expensive though!”

I’m not jealous.

I’m talking about policy and public expenditure.

Okay.

Well any parent of a disabled child will tell you that life isn’t fair, and it’s a fairly strange take to be jealous of our families and the reason they need those extra resources.

It’s really a horrendous way to live, at points, and you don’t actually want the resources because that would mean facing the challenges that warrant them.

No.

Many of them worked and coped ok until the ‘world of neurodiversity’ opened up and encouraged introspection and convinced them they’re immutably disabled.

The equality act defines who is disabled. There's no reform of that going on.

Does it ever occur to you the reason they feel that way is because they had such a shit experience in education and never had the right support?

You don’t have to, but this is an area of public spending and taxpayers will have an opinion whether you want to hear it or not. You don’t have to engage with me, and I haven’t said anything ‘disgusting’.

All children have different challenges but the majority are expected to follow a set path nonetheless. My daughter has strengths and weaknesses but is a typical child so school will not play to these. She has to fit in. All parents love their children. But it’s unfair for some children to receive many many many many times more resources than others.

Children with wheelchairs will struggle to get into school if it has steps. Shall we dump them on an inadequate online package too?

I couldn't agree with this more.

My son isn't more disabled or more worthy of specialist support just because he isn't 'able bodied' and is clearly physically disabled because he has a wheelchair.

Your son and other children with needs similar to your son are absolutely disabled, without a doubt. Of course they are.

Nothing wrong with that really? Fixed cost for fixed services like the private contracts on the NHS with clearly defined parameters. And if kids are identified earlier and invested in earlier, then the outcomes will be better and less stress for the parents.
I can see how people who fought tooth and nail are worried but not all change is bad. As we have further medical advances and more understanding that has to be a good thing.
Clearly defined parameters and processes and a pathway that works aren’t a bad thing. Point is we are largely talking about an interface between health and education and as both is state in theory, data is there. People are having fewer kids and we need to invest in each child from conception and services need to talk to each other. Maybe potentially it’s a bit more nanny state but kids are precious and need protecting especially vulnerable ones.

I agree.

My son has no difficulties with a mainstream class. It's a reason why I hope it isn't decided that he's stuck in a hub that I can't imagine will be suitable for him. He isn't disruptive, he doesn't have any behavioural issues etc his support needs are purely physical. He can't get around by himself.

@Playingvideogames

Reasonable SENd parents don’t organise our children by some hierarchy of disability, we recognise that we all have children with different challenges, that are relevant to our families and the way they impact us.

I’ve encountered @Kirbert2 for example many times on these threads, and I don’t want to speak out of turn against her, but I know the information she’s shared on her son, as much as she knows the same of mine.

Whilst her son doesn’t have the cognitive difficulties mine does, we share sleepless nights. Nobody’s ever told me my son’s health might affect his future, or worse. He was born disabled, and our adjustment to that has had time to be gradual. There is no single event that turned our life upside down - it’s always been that way.

Her son is able to cope in mainstream, with support - mine isn’t. But that doesn’t mean he’s any less worthy of support, or that their lives don’t face challenges that might be different to ours, but still count.

I think the idea that people like you would categorise our kids by more or less worthy, when as SENd parents we’re actually able to respect each other’s differences and challenges, is frankly disgusting.

I think they’re going to effectively force independent provision to provide X at Y cost, to fit the streams they’re creating.

Basically it sounds like things will be far less personalised - there will be streams and everyone will be ‘streamed’, without lots of personalised add ons.

I think in many cases, it’s the pupils with SEMH who find it most difficult to be in a mainstream classroom and cause the most disruption to the teaching and learning for the rest of the class.

a child with a feeding tube in my experience wouldn’t even qualify for a ehcp based on that alone.

I think maybe the fact it is going to be more centrally funded and independent specialist will be regulated are potentially good things? And the fact that s lot more minor learning issues will get more support?
And poorer kids in poorer areas may lose out less if it’s more automatic than a legal fight? And if it is centralised and streamlined it will be harder to hoodwink Ofsted?

Of course it is.

Um my daughter would have ended up with zero education or qualifications without her EHCP. Her EHCP has enabled her to get the qualifications she’s capable of and to be on line to become a taxpayer as opposed to a life on benefits.

Honestly the short term and long term ignorance from some as regards this subject is huge.

They havent said it will only be for physical disabilities and severe learning difficulties.

The 7 profiles they suggest literally reference asd and adhd in two of the profiles which are externalised and internalised behaviour profiles and look to be replacing the old single semh.

(plus autism would meet the criteria for the executive function one in many cases of autism)