My Lords, this has been an interesting and useful debate. For me, the report by the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, was very telling. As he said, taking his report and the amendments together would be very empowering for young people with SEN and disabilities. The Minister responded to each of the amendments and that is encouraging, but I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, hopes the Government will go further. I hope there can be further discussions.
I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, for her support. Like my noble friend Lady Chapman, I found her speech moving and instructive. I am afraid that experience is all too common. I am sure all of us have experienced discussions with parents who have real problems when their children have illnesses and the school is not able to respond in the necessary way. As I have mentioned before, I think that, in the new arrangements in the health service—the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, will know about the integrated care partnerships—there must be an opportunity for the health service and schools within health ICS boundaries to talk together about how some of this can be resolved.
I noted what the Minister said about statutory guidance. She will know that the problem is that it is not working in some areas—the noble Lord, Lord Storey, talked about inconsistencies—so I am sure that her offer of a meeting with the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, will be very welcome.
I turn to my amendments. I am struck by the poor outcomes for deaf people. Some 55% to 58% of deaf people are in employment, compared with 81% of non-disabled people. More generally, disabled people experience higher rates of unemployment and economic inactivity. I am convinced that part of the issue lies with schools and the need for more support of them. The Minister said on my Amendment 97 that local authorities are required to provide specialist support, but they are flexible on funding and, unfortunately, over the last few years that flexibility has not worked in deaf children’s favour.
I note what the Minister said about the school register on Amendment 99. That is very welcome, and I thank her for that assurance.
My noble friend Lady Chapman ended by saying she thought the Government could table amendments later on to meet some of these points and respond after the Green Paper. The Minister said that that was not possible, but I still think there are great opportunities to pause the Bill to allow her time to do so, and I hope the Government will think again about that. Having said that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.