Live webchat about the impact of the Children and Families Bill on children with additional needs, with Mencap and the Special Educational Consortium, Tuesday December 10 at 1pm

[RowanMumsnet]

We're pleased to announce that James Robinson, Policy Officer at Mencap, and Matthew Dodd, coordinator of the Special Educational Consortium, will be joining us for a live webchat on Tuesday December 10 to discuss the Children and Families Bill and its potential impact on children with additional needs.

As many of you will know, the Children and Families Bill has been making its way through Parliament and is about to enter the Report stage in the House of Lords - meaning that unless something major happens, it will become law at some point early-ish next year.

The Bill seeks to make changes to things like adoption law, the care system and the family courts system; but in this webchat we're going to be concentrating on the changes it will make to the provision of education and social care to children with additional needs.

Some fairly major changes are proposed, including:

· The replacement of statements of special educational needs with Education, Health and Care plans

· The extension of legal entitlements into the further education sector and potentially up to the age of 25

· Stronger duties on health, education and social care services to work together and jointly plan and commission services

Many organisations working with disabled children and young people have expressed concerns about some aspects of the bill, fearing that many of the reforms will not fulfill the Government's stated intention of creating a more joined-up, less adversarial system for children and young people with special educational needs or disabilities. For example, there is no duty on local authorities to deliver the social care services identified in Education Health and Care plans, and no single point of appeal. (See SEC's Briefing for the House of Lords, which goes into more detail).

We know that many Mumsnetters have been active in analysing the Bill and feeding back to Parliament on its provisions, so we hope you'll join us on Tuesday to discuss its possible impact and what might happen next. As ever, if you can't join us live on the day, do please post up your advance questions here.

Thanks
MNHQ

@PassionateMum

If IPSEA are right - which they usually are in my experiance - what on earth is going to happen when my son reaches 16 years old and the LA start sending all documents to him - not me! Will I have to go to court to remain in the conversation? This is just outrageous. What will Mencap and SEC do about it?

Hi PassionateMum,

Thanks for your question - a really good one!

The reforms mean that, "when a child is over compulsory school age it is their views that take precedence over those of their parents, in respect of assessments and Education, Health and Care Plans". While it is good that young people are involved in decisions that affect them, this needs to be accompanied by the appropriate safeguards to ensure decisions are made in their best interests. There is currently a very blurred line in the 16-18 age group and I don't believe the draft SEN Code of Practice clarifies this enough, nor does it appreciate that there are some decisions that they may wish to be more involved in than others.

The draft Code of Practice does state that families should ordinarily be involved in discussions about a young person's provision, but this is clearly a very tricky issue and one that needs looking at further.

Mencap - and others in the sector - have made this very clear to government as this is something that the reforms really need to get right.

James

IPSEA tweeted today to say they were calling for a moratorium.

My question is what is your view? What have you got to lose?

IPSEA

IPSEA chief executive, Jane McConnell, says: “Now is the time for Government to listen carefully and actually hear what is being said - and then act on it. At this moment in time, IPSEA has no other choice than to call for a moratorium on this legislation in order to get it right. Political enthusiasm for making a change must not be allowed to drive bad legislation forward - negatively impacting children, young people and their families for the rest of their lives.”

here

Right, James and Matthew are signing off.

Thanks so much for all these questions, great detail and I know Matthew and James found really interesting and helpful (and are still discussing the questions now).

Thanks to James and Matthew too - really helpful and kind of you to come over to MNHQ.

Katie

@HotheadPaisan

Hope to make it tomorrow. Could do with some background on what SEC and Mencap's take is on the potential impact so I can think of questions.

My main concerns are that it will all take longer than it already does to get support and there will be no clear lines of appeal or challenge for any of the provision if it isn't specified or doesn't materialise. Also, will there be a keyworker for each child?

Hi HotheadPaisan,

Good questions and I’m happy to try and answer them.

In terms of our view of the Bill and its potential impact, Mencap does not believe that, in its current state, the reforms will achieve the system improvement that is needed to work for people with a learning disability and their families and carers. I think the major issue that still remains are:

• that there is currently no duty on local authorities to provide the social care support that is set out in an EHC Plan; and
• that there is no single point for parents and young people to complain to about their provision. So, for example, if you want to complain about special educational provision, you can go via the SEN Tribunal. But if you want to complain about the social care provision it’s the LA complaints process and the Local Government Ombudsman, and if you want to complain about health provision it’s the NHS complaints process and the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman.

In terms of getting support, the timeframes for completing an assessment is actually being reduced from 26 to 20 weeks so, in theory, it should take less time.

Keyworking is mentioned in the draft Code of Practice, but it’s pretty weak. The keyworking role will cover casework and informal advocacy as well as attending meetings. However, this is only something the local authority SHOULD provide as part of their information, advice and support function. Moreover, there is mention of an Independent Supporter role to help guide families through the assessment and planning process, but this is “subject to availability”. So, there is no guarantee of a keyworker although the sector is making very strong representations to strengthen this – from Mencap’s perspective, keyworkers could help determine whether these reforms work for families or not. It’s that important.

James

Should...

Could....

Must....

Thank you for responding.

I'm not really understanding why direct payments are confusing anyone as they have existed for social care and transport for some time. I can only assume therefore the confusion surrounds how a Local Authorities avoid parents getting control or directing money away from their inadequate services.

As for the process involved in getting them for a TA. It sounds a much faster pathway to effective provision than anything we have experienced do far which seems to consist of years of circular meetings with very few outcomes save from the meetings themselves.

I would also like to see the bill halted, rethought and based on evidence.

I differ in my opinion with IE only about the money aspect. There probably isn't enough but I'd settle just for what there is, spent appropriately and directly on the children it is supposed to fund.

Star - I agree with you 100% on that.

Just remembered on my DP application, my file showed the DfE were in the background advising (the LA are particularly poor at effective redactions!). Not sure how appropriate this is on individual cases?

Also, the LA lawyer advises she has been told if DPs are granted, they can always find some reason to remove them later down the line. This is the advice she has received.

Not much to broker there then is there? And all right in front of the DfE.

There has been good analysis of what was 'wrong' in the first place (Lamb, Bercow etc.). But none of the evidence from those reports has any link to the proposed changes.

The very fact that the changes are coming in before the pathfinders have fed back their evidence shows how little the Government care for what is found. Local Authorities are spending all of their energy protecting their empires and fighting the cuts to their budgets or the outsourcing of their services.

Charities have taken and spent money on the reform process making it difficult for them to do a U-turn with any credibility. Law firms are jumping up and down in delight on both the parent and LA sides and they are busy setting up pretend independent mediation companies.

Schools are being told they have to fund everything out of their own shrinking budget with the only way out being exclusion and a send off to the local profit-making Independent dumping ground at the expense of the tax payer.

Parents are left with a choice of shut up and put up, privately fund or home educate. They are left with no advocates at all.

Excellent response!

My last sentence should have said 'and the children are left with no advocates at all, except for their parents and NO-ONE IS LISTENING TO THEM, least of all the charities'.

Wonder when James will get back to me on this point?

Commissioning bodies will have the right to call for a reassessment anytime they want to. So if you've finally got your plan described, specified and quantified, and perhaps gone through tribunal, Health could turn round the next month and ask for it to be changed. They can do this.

On the other point you make, I will look into it and get back to you if that's ok.

So the pathfinder LAs have decided collectively not to follow the order to advise parents they may request DPs.

This is because they have no intention of ever offering them and to further their agenda on this they are reporting back that parents are finding them too complex.

In reality, the only complexity is in how to get LAs to comply with the order.

Hothead you are dead right there. I have a disabled brother and they are always desperate to get him to take DPs.

Yet my experience mirrors Sen's.

The charity consortia know this but have failed to address the reality of the current system let alone the pilots.

The DfE don't want to know and seemed hostile to my pursuit of it DPs so why this charade? I imagine LAs don't want to lose control of provision until there's a properly established 'brokerage' in place where they've contracted out provision to the cheapest providers.

The bottom line is - public bodies cannot pick and choose which laws to follow. You have a right to apply (although it doesn't mean you will get DPs) and they have an obligation to provide info in accordance with the pilot order.

If they don't, it is judicially reviewable - end of. I'm tired of apologists for multi-million pound corporate bodies who act unlawfully.

It's time to start focussing on protecting children's rights.

These reforms don't change the core problems with the system.

Hi senmerrygoround, apologies for not getting back to you sooner about your final point.

As you say, the draft regulations state that a local authority “must secure a reassessment of a child or young person’s EHC Plan where it receives a request to do so from the responsible commissioning body for that child or young person”. This is a concern because it does allow health agencies, for example, to request a reassessment with a view to changing some of the health provisions set out in a plan.

I would point out, however, that the regulations do state that, in respect of this right for a commissioning body to request a reassessment, a local authority may reject it if it has already carried out an assessment/reassessment in the past 6 months or if “it is not necessary for the authority to make a further assessment”. The draft Code of Practice clarifies that this could be because they do not believe a child or young person’s needs have changed significantly.

This does therefore offer safeguards against the scenario you set out. In saying that, the draft Code of Practice does state that a council can reassess sooner “if they think it necessary”. For Mencap, this wording requires clarification in order to avoid the potential of a cycle of assessment and reassessment that would clearly not be in the best interests of the child or young person and their family. This has been, and will again be, raised with the DfE, so thank you for flagging it up.

I have also noticed that there have been further posts about personal budgets and the lack of willing amongst local authorities to offer them. In the latest Council for Disabled Children Digest, there is a Q&A with the Minister, Edward Timpson MP, about direct payments that I thought might be of interest: www.councilfordisabledchildren.org.uk/media/528061/Digest-2013-Dec.pdf (the specific question is on page 4, but the Q&A also extends beyond this).

Mencap still has major concerns about the lack of evidence and testing underpinning personal budgets in SEN, and one of the main things I’ll take away from this webchat is the strength of feeling about them. It’s vitally important that the government is aware of the issues and points you have raised and we’ll make sure they are relayed to them.

Finally, as I said before, if anyone has specific questions, I’d also be happy for you to email me on [email protected].

I hope you all have a great Christmas and a happy new year!

James

Thank you for coming back and responding James. And for sharing your email address.

I haven't had a chance to read it all yet but I think one of the amendments to the bill in the house of lords yesterday is asking that health or social care provision which is 'educational' should remain as special educational provision - in which case the situation would remain as now that if health stopped / changed provision the duty would fall back on education to provide it.

This one?

Clause 21

Page 20, line 16, leave out subsection (5) and insert—
“(5) Health care provision or social care provision which educates or trains a child or young person is to be treated as special educational provision (instead of health care provision or social care provision).”

www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/bills/lbill/2013-2014/0059/amend/su059-I-rev-c.htm