HC Deb 27 May 2004 vol 421 cc1701-3
7. Tony Cunningham (Workington) (Lab)

What effects the Government's strategy for special educational needs will have on children with special needs. [175995]

The Secretary of State for Education and Skills (Mr. Charles Clarke)

The strategy that we published early this year will significantly help to improve the quality of education of children with special needs. The strategy contains a programme of practical measures to promote early identification of children's special educational needs, boost early intervention on the basis of that identification, improve co-ordination of services to children and their families, improve staff training and build strong collaboration between mainstream and special schools to share knowledge and expertise. They will help to provide the opportunities and support for children with special educational needs to realise their full potential.

Tony Cunningham

Last Friday, as part of autism awareness week, I met parents in west Cumbria whose children suffer from autism. Will my right hon. Friend tell us what the Government are doing to deal with those children's special needs?

Mr. Clarke

Yes, I certainly can. One of the strengths of our strategy is that we focus on each special educational need's characteristics and then build a partnership between the voluntary organisations concerned, the education service and the health service to address that special need. I appreciate the work done in national autism week to highlight these issues, and as part of early support pilot programme, we will shortly provide guidance for the parents of nought to three-year-olds who are diagnosed with autistic spectrum disorder. I hope that that will help to build the early identification and intervention that is so necessary and such a central part of our programme.

Mr. Phil Willis (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (LD)

A year ago, Ofsted delivered the most damning indictment of special educational needs provision in mainstream schools. A year later, we have had a strategy document, but absolutely nothing else. Statistics released today show that, last year, 6,000 students with SEN were permanently excluded from their schools. Students are nine times more likely to be excluded if they have a special educational need than if they have not. Over the past year, how many additional teachers have been trained and recruited to meet Ofsted's requirement? How many schools have had whole-staff training to meet the needs of the inclusion programme? What is the Secretary of State doing specifically to deal with the abhorrent permanent exclusion of children with SEN conditions from our schools?

Mr. Clarke

I simply do not accept the catalogue that the hon. Gentleman describes, but he is right to suggest that the situation is serious in many parts of the country, as Ofsted identified. I agree that major issues need to be addressed, but we are implementing our strategy and the resources involved are substantial. For example, in 2003–04, funding for special educational needs was almost £3.5 billion—13 per cent. of the overall schools budget—of which about £1.5 billion was spent on SEN in special schools and £1.7 billion on special provision in mainstream education and so on. There is a major commitment. We are working with the associations and local government to deliver in this respect. He is right to raise his concerns and to press them, as all hon. Members would wish to work with him, but he is wrong to say that we are not taking action. In fact, we are taking very strong action indeed.

Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire) (Con)

Did the Secretary of State see the moving article written by our colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron), in last Saturday'sTelegraph, in which he underlined how crucial it is that certain children should never be put into mainstream schools? If he did not read that article, will he please do so? When he has done so, will he write to me?

Mr. Clarke

As it happens, I did read that article and I am happy to write to the hon. Gentleman, but the problem with the debate about inclusion is that there are dogmatists on all sides. Some people say that there must never be inclusion, others that there must always be inclusion. What is necessary is to create a system with the capacity that we have built up to enable the right choices to be made for each child's individual circumstances. It is difficult to get to that point because there are significant resource implications in the education of children with special educational needs. I certainly do not hide, as I did not from the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Mr. Willis) a few moments ago, the fact that we still have a great deal of work to do in some areas, but the core principle must be that we have a system to do what is right for individual children. I will write to the hon. Gentleman on the particular point.

Mr. Mark Hoban (Fareham) (Con)

Has the Secretary of State read the report produced yesterday by the Down's Syndrome Association, in which parents express the concerns that many involved in special educational needs have expressed? One parent said: Our local authority is bent on achieving inclusion and the reduction of special schools. Another parent said: The important factor is choice … a mainstream only route is a dangerous one size fits all approach. Is it not time to put a moratorium on the closure of special schools to maintain parental choice and ensure that those centres of excellence serve not just today's children, but tomorrow's too?

Mr. Clarke

Unfortunately, I have not read that article. About the same number of children are being educated in special schools now as they were 10 years ago. I agree with the hon. Gentleman, however. I have met groups of parents who feared the closure of a school in their local authority and I know that they felt unengaged and thought the decision was wrong for their children. That is why I gave the answer that I did to the hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack). This must not be a dogmatic process. There has to be proper consultation with the community, in particular with the parents and carers of those children. The needs of the individual child have to come first.

I maintain the general view that it is best to find a system for the education of children with special educational needs that bears some relationship to the general system, rather than putting them in ghettos of any particular form. It is a difficult management question and, in some cases, a difficult political question. It is difficult to get it right, but I believe that that is the correct direction to take.

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