My own child has a diagnosis of ASD so I'm hardly likely to see it as irrelevant to their education or well-being.
The point I was making is that the bursary system is not being used for those children in society who are most in need of largesse from an education charity, ie, low achieving children from deprived families.
I have yet to come across a single private school which awards generous bursaries to children with ASD who are struggling with low achievement and behavioural problems in the state sector. All the children I know who are at private schools are there because their usually middle-class and extremely well informed parents have managed to secure state funding for them through an EHCP, and they are not generally at mainstream schools.
All the children I know with bursaries at private schools are high achieving in at least one area: music, sport, or academia, and have parents who are fiercely supportive.
If anyone can point me in the direction of a mainstream private school which offers generous bursaries to children like the ones at my dc's state school - disadvantaged children with learning difficulties and often behavioural problems, who would really benefit from the wrap around care, lots of teacher attention, small classes and calm atmosphere of a private school, I'd be very impressed. As far as I'm aware no private school welcomes kids like this, regardless of how much the child might benefit from that sort of environment.
Charity only goes so far....