Education and Inspections Bill

I speak to Amendments Nos. 6 and 9, both tabled in my name and in the name of my noble friend Lady Darcy de Knayth. Amendment No. 6 would correct an anomaly between academies and other publicly funded schools in the admission of pupils with a statement of special educational needs. At present, with an LEA-maintained school, parents can expect that, if the LEA agrees with their expressed preference, it will direct a school to take their child. However, with an academy, the child may not be admitted to the parents’ preferred school even where the LEA agrees with the parents’ stated preference. There follows a convoluted and time-consuming process, with mediation arrangements to resolve the disagreement between the LEA and the academy, followed by an appeal to the Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal, followed ultimately, if necessary, by a ruling by the Secretary of State. It seems unnecessary to take so many steps and for there to be so many more hurdles to jump through for parents of a statemented child who want their child to go to an academy than for parents who want their child to go to an LEA-maintained school. The question whether academies take more statemented pupils than do maintained schools is rather different from the question of whether there is an unequal process. The extra hurdles faced by parents who want an academy place for their statemented child are still extra hurdles, however many statemented children there may already be in academies. The Minister said at Second Reading that he and his colleagues are looking to see whether they can make further changes in this area, and I look forward to hearing the result of these deliberations. Amendment No. 9 is about support services and the impact that good support services can have on ensuring that every disabled child and every child with SEN can achieve their educational potential. No child can achieve their educational potential on their own. For disabled children and children with SEN, support services providing training, support and advice to teachers are crucial to supplement and complement the expertise that exists in any school. As noble Lords will know, training in SEN and disability is not required in initial teacher training, which makes ongoing access to such training all the more crucial for teachers. Ofsted’s 2005 report on the impact of LEA support and outreach services sets out how support service staff can bring in knowledge and skills which are usually unavailable in a mainstream school, and make a major contribution to a pupil’s progress. However, support services are under threat. The practice of delegating funding directly to schools to support disabled pupils and pupils with SEN, while helpful in many ways, means that for some LEAs it is very difficult to maintain support services. In some cases, support services are not being purchased by schools because they do not have enough money to buy the services back. In other cases, it is because teachers are not aware of the support available to them or do not understand the difference it could make. According to Ofsted, "““delegation of funding to schools reduced the LEA’s capacity to provide targeted support for school improvement where the standards achieved by pupils with SEN were too low””." That reduction in capacity could have a real effect on pupil outcomes. Amendment No. 9 places a duty on LEAs to make sure that support services are available. I hope that the Minister will be able to offer some reassurance that the support and expertise, which make such a difference to the progress of disabled children and children with SEN, will continue to be provided.