We now know Catherine McKinnell, the schools minister, has SEND in her portfolio and yesterday, we heard something of what’s in store for education in the King’s speech – including a Children’s Wellbeing Bill
“My Ministers will seek to raise educational standards and break down barriers to opportunity…A Bill will be introduced to raise standards in education and promote children’s wellbeing [Children’s Wellbeing Bill]. Measures will be brought forward to remove the exemption from Value Added Tax for private school fees, which will enable the funding of six and a half thousand new teachers. My Government will establish Skills England which will have a new partnership with employers at its heart [Skills England Bill], and my Ministers will reform the apprenticeship levy.” King’s speech
What’s a Children’s Wellbeing Bill about?
The big talking point in this area was the introduction of a Children’s Wellbeing Bill (CWB). Under the banner “Break down the barriers to opportunity” The Children’s Wellbeing Bill aims to “put children and their wellbeing at the centre of the education and children’s social care systems, and make changes so they are safe, healthy, happy and treated fairly.”
Making wellbeing central is something that fills me with hope, as I agree with the theory of futurist Stephan A Schwartz in his book “The 8 Laws of Change” that fostering wellbeing should be at the heart of everything government and individuals do as agents of social transformation.
What exactly do they mean by wellbeing?
The UN defines wellbeing thus:
There is so far no mention of implementing the recommendations of the UNCRPD into UK law, something you would hope might be high on Labour’s to-do list. But perhaps, just perhaps, when the detail of the CWB is revealed, many, if not all, of the UNCRPD tenets will be included.
This Bill, however, seems to be something of a smorgasbord, with lots of things on the table that you wouldn’t peg immediately as wellbeing-related. Early criticism is that it doesn’t do enough to target children living in poverty, aside from free breakfast clubs in primary schools.
Removing Barriers to Opportunity…
The Children’s Wellbeing Bill aims to “raise school standards to ensure the school system is fair for every child, no matter their background…”
It’s a catchy headline, but what does that mean when it comes to SEND education?
Where SEND is concerned, the Bill states as am aim, “requiring all schools to cooperate with the local authority on school admissions, SEND inclusion, and place planning, by giving local authorities greater powers to help them deliver their functions on school admissions and ensure admissions decisions account for the needs for communities.”
SEND inclusion almost seems to have been stuck in there for lack of anywhere else to add it. In this context, it’s presumably included as an intention to stop a school telling parents it can’t support their child and they’re better off up the road at another school.
But ensuring children with SEND are “allowed” in to their local school is a tiny fraction of what inclusion is – and far from the most important. Simply forcing schools to shoehorn children into a potentially unsuitable mainstream place, without the resources or SEND-trained staff to support them, is putting a sticking plaster over a gaping wound; it’s not enough and it won’t hold. Inclusion must be resourced and central to future educational policy and planning, as we said in our 7-point letter to Bridget Phillipson.
Without this, the child may find themself without the support they need to thrive or, as too often happens, having their parents asked to pick them up during the day (i.e. unlawfully excluded) if they’re having tough morning, permanently excluded, or slipped off-roll to another school or alternative provision. Schools lacking an inclusive culture will find a way to keep themselves that way. Threatening them with legislation is fine, but if they’re not deterred by existing equality and SEND legislation, why should this be any different?
Also read: SNJ’s 7-point open letter to Bridget Phillipson, new Secretary of State for Education
What else is on the agenda?
- Children Not in School register This was something planned by the last government, sparking dismay from those home-educating who would rather not be on any register. However, this new government is pushing ahead, saying it will “provide support to home-educating parents”, though it’s not clear how. In any case, a register is good for ensuring excluded children and disabled children who are without provision do not “slip under the radar.”
- Stronger powers for Ofsted : “…changes to the legislation about regulating and inspecting independent schools, including providing Ofsted with stronger powers to investigate the offence of operating an unregistered independent school.” Additionally, it aims to bring multi-academy trusts into the inspection system, something Ofsted has long called for.
- Consistency of education: ensuring greater consistency between academies and maintained schools by requiring all schools to teach the national curriculum, giving every child a broad and rounded education. But it doesn’t mention re-broadening the curriculum so every child can learn something they shine at, whether it’s STEM or a practical skill.
- Teacher Qualifications: ensuring any new teacher entering the classroom has, or is working towards, Qualified Teacher Status (QTS). Also giving school support staff a national voice in setting their pay and conditions. (Is that about children’s wellbeing?) Bridget Phillipson has already outlined plans for training 6,500 new teachers, but what they will need is a solid grounding in SEND. We would call on the government when looking at the detail, to ensure that SEND content in teacher training is boosted, and, as we also asked for in our 7-point letter, that SEND CPD is mandatory for every teacher, most likely through the existing Universal SEND Services training that it already funds.
Labour has also announced its intention for an updated Mental Health Act, but it’s not clear if or how this will include children. We believe that’s vital, given CAMHS being overwhelmed and with too-high thresholds for access.
We hope the meat on the bones of the Bill will be more reflective of what is really important to children’s wellbeing. Because without easy access to effective and expert mental health support, without tackling childhood poverty, and without ensuring equality for disabled children’s education, it’s a real stretch to call it a Children’s Wellbeing Bill. We will be looking closely at how this develops, and doing our best to get your voice heard.
We also want to know what the new government’s intentions are regarding the Change Programme, and the high-needs debt relief programmes, given the increasing evidence of unlawfulness, and the effect that cuts will have on vulnerable children.
Holding public officials to account
A final note of interest is the Hillsborough Bill, so named after the 1989 Hillsborough football stadium tragedy, that was made even worse by public officials’ lies and cover-ups. It also cites the more recent Infected Blood inquiry. The Bill is described as “the catalyst for a changed culture in the public sector”
“Recent reports have highlighted the defensive culture and lack of candour in parts of the public sector and the current codes and rules in place across the public sector vary in their nature, legal basis and ability to enforce the right behaviours when things have gone wrong.” Kings Speech
Accountability is one of the most pressing issues in SEND. While it seems that this Bill is focusing on national scandals and public inquiries, when you look at the headline aims, you can see where May SEND fit:
- improving transparency and accountability where failure in the provision and delivery of public services is the subject of public investigation and scrutiny.
- reducing the culture of defensiveness in the public sector.
It also includes a Labour manifesto pledge to “provide legal aid for victims of disasters or state-related death.”
NHS staff are already bound by a duty of candour, so we could see local government officials being held to the same duty? Would this extend to deaths in state-funded residential provision or is it beyond the remit? It may be unlikely to drill down that far if it’s confined to larger-scale happenings.
Even so, this existing NHS duty didn’t prevent the cover-ups of those, young and old, who have died from poor, inappropriate, or lack of care within the NHS and CAMHS. This will be something we’ll be watching with great interest…
What’s your take? Let us know in the comments below.
Also read:
- SNJ’s 7-point open letter to Bridget Phillipson, new Secretary of State for Education
- More system “reform” won’t fix SEND, because the real problem still hasn’t been accepted
- “Every learner matters and matters equally”. But in England’s education system, do they really?
- Uncovering the hidden truth about SEND safety valve agreements and how they’ll cut children’s SEND provision
- Parent campaigners: We must suspend the SEND Safety Valve programme: Here’s why, and how
- 83% educators say SEND learners aren’t effectively supported to achieve, says 2024 Pearson school report
- Life Wirral School abuse scandal: Should For-Profit companies be allowed to run special schools?
- Depressingly awful data and our 2024 EHCP Hall of Shame reveal the sad state of disabled children’s education, with growing numbers out of school
- The nine top asks from SEND organisations for the next government
Don’t miss a thing!
Don’t miss any posts from SNJ – simply add your email address below. You must click the link in the confirmation email you’ll receive to activate your free subscription.
You can also keep up with us by following our
Want more? Be an SNJ regular donor!
SNJ is a non-profit and everyone who writes here does so voluntarily. We need your support to help us with costs by donating once or as a regular patron. Find out more here
She is a rare disease & chronic pain patient advocate with Ehlers Danlos syndrome.
- Oops, we did it again… The Government must now listen to more than 100,000 people who do not want to lose SEND rights - October 1, 2026
- Could using AI to filter Government consultation responses lead to “algorithmic silencing” of neurodivergent voices? - September 30, 2026
- DfE must give its SEND reform Child Rights Impact Assessment a do-over; this time, without marking its own homework - September 24, 2026
Please share this article!
Discover more from Special Needs Jungle
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
I don’t think the register of children not in school will do anything to stop excluded children or those with no suitable provision falling off the radar. The LA must be informed if a child is excluded from school, is persistently absent or is withdrawn for home education, so if the LA is doing its job properly it should already have this information and if the government wants national figures and to hold the LAs to account over them, it can do that with existing data.
The register will merely put the onus on the parents/carers to keep providing the LA with information they most likely already have, under pain of fines or similar punishments for not complying. It will likely not force LAs to do anything useful with that information beyond the powers they already have, which they too often do not use to any great effect. Obviously we will have to see the detail of the proposals, but I find it hard to imagine there are any parents out there with disabled children with no school place who do not already work hard to make sure the LA doesn’t ignore them. If repeated phone calls, emails, meetings, mediation, tribunals, etc. don’t resolve the issue, how will a register?