The Schools White Paper: What you need to know

Instead of SEN Support and EHCPs, the white paper proposes three layers or tiers of support above ‘universal’:  

• Targeted – for children with ‘commonly occurring’ conditions. Delivered in the classroom, in small groups or in an ‘inclusion base’.   

• Targeted plus - for children with less common or more complex needs that need specialist input. They get access to the new Experts at Hand (see below) and inclusion bases. They might also have a short-term placement in alternative provision or a specialist setting.  

• Specialist support – for children with more complex needs. The support will be defined through new Specialist Provision Packages (SPPs). Only children who need an SPP will have an EHCP.   

All children on these layers of additional support will have an Individual Support Plan, which their school or setting has a duty to maintain.  

Just like the current individual education plans, ISPs will set out a child’s needs and the provision they need to make progress towards certain outcomes. But these plans will underpin every layer of support: targeted; targeted plus and specialist.  

The change is that schools will now have a statutory duty to create and maintain ISPs and they must be in a digital format. Also, ISPs will be monitored as part of the Ofsted inspection process.  

However, it is not clear how families might use this new legal accountability to challenge issues around SEND provision.  

For children with more complex needs, SPPs are a new, more fixed list of support models intended to bring national consistency and reduce what the government calls the ‘postcode lottery’ of support. They will be based on around seven areas of need.  

Children can only get an EHCP after the Specialist Provision Package and placement decisions have been made.   

SEND charities and parent organisations have already expressed concerns that SPPs may mean that fewer children are eligible for support, or that support is restricted to package criteria rather than individual need. There are also concerns that parent carers and children and young people are not included in the SPP process, only in the EHCP process afterwards.  

No child will be asked to leave a special school.  

Children and young people with specialist support needs maintain a right to an EHCP up to 25 if they continue in education. Those who already have an EHCP will keep theirs until the end of their current phase of education. This means that the first cohort of children to move to the new system will be those in Years 6, 11 and 13 in 2029/30.

In future, the government proposes that EHCPs will only be for children with more complex needs who require a Specialist Provision Package (SPP). The EHCP will be produced after the SPP decision, not before. Individual Support Plans will capture day-to-day provision, EHCPs will set out statutory entitlements.

The government say they will have faster assessments, clearer thresholds and a digital national EHCP template. There will also be a fast-track route for under-5s with complex needs.

Under the proposals, the SEND Tribunal will still consider appeals, but will focus on whether a child meets the criteria for a Specialist Support Package, which package is appropriate and their placement. However, the tribunal would no longer have the power to name a specific school. Instead, it could only require the local authority to reconsider its decision.  

The proposals also focus on improved complaints procedures for mainstream settings, and stronger, more consistent, mediation services.