To wonder where these kids are meant to go?!

[Wonderberry]

Unfortunately, my child's school is closing due to the VAT imposition on private school fees. She has special needs, and her fees are paid for by her EHCP, as it is a cheaper alternative to a special school. I am not rich. She cannot attend a state mainstream due to her special needs, and the council agrees with this.

I now have no school placement for her. The special schools are hugely oversubscribed (over 10 applications per place). Even if she could go to a state mainstream, there is no space in any of them, due to lots of schools closing locally. I have called dozens of them in desperation, as I need for her to go somewhere.

I have been frantically contacting the council to get her a new school place. They won't even respond. I'm faced with her being without any school place shortly. I cannot home school as I need to work.

My DD is far from alone in this. Unfortunately, the government has paid no thought into the wellbeing of SEND children, when imposing the VAT.

@TesterP0t my god if there was a child behaving in a way like that disruptive dangerous violent etc in my child’s lesson I would go ballistic not fair on the child and not fair on the other children it’s inadequate all round. Your school sounds amazing sadly most others not so much

Schools do manage this which means expertise and best practise needs to be shared .

I don’t think some want the system to cater for more in main streams. They want their kids to receive a private education via the state and don’t give a shit as to the impact on the majority.

Oh but I bet they did think it out! Much like they expect the disabled to either get a job or wither away and expire when they stop their benefits either way the economy benefits . I think they see SEN dc as a drain on resources too - I think it was yesterday I saw an article about the huge cost of SEN to local authorities. I can see cuts there next and what do they think will happen that suddenly all these children will just change ???? They seem to be going after every vulnerable group in order to offset their spending elsewhere. Wouldn’t surprise me if to offset the Trump tariffs they decided to make cuts to ICU beds and the emergency services to save money somewhere ! The colour may be red but they identify as blue !

Many children with sen cannot access the curriculum, especially at secondary school. This is one of the fundamental problems. Michael Gove was the last secretary of state to change the curriculum - he was focused on raising our maths and English to compete with China but his reforms did nothing for the children who are nowhere near that level.

As a result, local authorities have all these kids they can't place in mainstream. And they can't suddenly build loads of new schools. My LA is actually building a new secondary for kids with autism but that's unusual and until it is ready, they still have to use independent schools.

Remember the transport issue too. You can't easily send children miles away unless you fund their transport and that can be as expensive as the school fees.

Schools do manage this

Except, for some, they don’t. See the success rate at SENDIST, the increasing number with EOTAS/EOTIS, the exclusion and suspension rates, the absence rate, the number of LGO cases about AP.

Ok so instead of shaking the money tree the schools that do need to be examined and copied.

So why put in a policy that makes it harder for those who pay and have dc with SEN to leave and use state?

Copying one (or even more than one) school’s provision will not work for all. There are some DC for whom any state school is inappropriate no matter what the school does or what support is provided.

Have you contacted Education Not Taxation? I don't know if I am allowed to link their Facebook page but you are not alone. Get your story told by those trying to help.

As a labour voter all my life I am reluctantly forced to agree with you.

It's quite harrowing when your child comes home and tells you about one of their classmates repeatedly hitting their head so hard on a desk that it bleeds. Or when another parent cries on your shoulder because her ND child is dragged kicking and screaming into school everyday by the headteacher and then ends up spending most of the day by herself in a small windowless closet that has been renamed "the sensory space" or some other bollocks like that.

LAs are tight as fuck and anyone getting money out of them for a private school has a child that sadly most people would run a mile if expected to parent and every state school in the area has probably responded "Woa, we wouldn't touch him/her with a barge-pole!" (expressed in sanitised terms as "unfortunately we can't meet their needs").

As for the idea that SEN parents should be expected to be available the whole time and "education not childcare" and all that guff, it just makes me see red.

The sooner we enshrine in law a right to 35 hours a week of education/childcare/respite (whatever you want to call it) for children with significant needs, the better. Their parents (mostly mothers, fathers not infrequently leave) already have a tough enough job without being told "sorry, you'll just have to give up on any job or separate identity, default on your mortgage and live in poverty and we don't really care about families like you".

The other thing to point out is that many of the private schools could if they felt the need to, relist themselves as section 41 schools, but it’s not in their financial interest to. So whilst the Daily Heil type headline may make it appear that LAs are sending droves of SEN kids to Eton and Harrow, in actual fact they’re sending loads to specialist provision in all but name.

Totally agree. And simultaneously the LA find the money to tee up barristers to argue against self representing parents.

It’s shocking. I know personally of 2 disabled people who were unwell on election day and dragged themselves to vote for Labour. Its heartbreaking

@Laughingdoggo agree. The general public would be aghast if they knew how much LAs spend on defending indefensible cases against unrepresented.

Your ignorance is quite astounding.

My DS had two failed mainstream placements before being placed in his current school.

We actually persisted with the village school in walking distance from our home for some time after we were advised it probably wasn't going to be able to meet his needs, because we are genuinely committed to the principle that wherever possible children should go to their local school and be part of their local community. We were really invested in that school working out for him as it had for our older child.

Unfortunately, it didn't work out at all and we then moved DS to the next nearest mainstream primary. We were advised this school had an excellent reputation with SEN and had lots of facilities and support available. It was an absolute disaster for DS who didn't cope at all with the change, and was failed very badly by the school, who turned out to be keener on his EHCP funding than they were on actually spending it on DS. Suffice to say I went on to win a disability discrimination tribunal against that school after DS left.

But it wasn't until DS had two failed mainstream placements that our LA would even look at independent schools. It wasn't anybody's first choice, certainly not ours. Trust me, I'd be much happier if he hopped on the bus to the local comp every morning with the kids he was in reception with.

@TesterP0t your ignorance is a bit off you are if the ilk of Brigit and Rachel not listening to any other point of view

Yes. I attended one last month where the LA have failed to provide a school for over a year, put the family under immense strain, and their barrister argued all the reasons that the child couldn’t go to the local special school despite admitting that he needed specialist provision. The judge asked how the LA planned to discharge its duty to provide a suitable education for a child of compulsory school age and the barrister said that that wasn’t in his brief and the LA had only instructed him to ensure that the special school wasn’t named.

The panel were appalled and even the brief had the good grace to look embarrassed and asked for a recess to call back for further instruction but it was clear how it was going to go. The judgement said that the LA’s conduct and evidence “fell well short” of what was expected. The child got the place, and the barrister got paid anyway. I looked him up and his open rate is £900 an hour.

I feel quite panicky at the mental load of dealing with that. And that’s the injury that only other SEN parents actually see. Well done you. X x x

Contact your local cllr as education comes under their purview.
Or contact the Cabinet member with responsibility for education at your local council. Ask them what is being done to support your child.
If no response, go to Education Ombudsman.

@Laughingdoggo nothing surprises me any more.

At the last hearing for DS1, my LA paid a barrister a large sum of money to turn up (late!) and concede. Infuriating.

Exactly - well put

It really isn't

You might not like it but it’s the truth.

It’s widely acknowledged in the sector as well. The sector I’ve worked in for 10 years in finance.

A school without decent reserves unable to keep pupil numbers up was always going to fail.

I did a little consultancy at a prep in Surrey two years ago. They were rife with poor management, waste, and absolutely no governance.

They’re closing ‘because of VAT’. They bloody aren’t in reality.

It isn't the truth. Maybe your truth but it isn't THE truth