In the last few months here at SNJ Towers, it feels like we’re playing a never-ending whack-a-mole tournament. Report after report about how terrible the SEND system is and how removing disabled children’s rights is a viable option. We are forced to whip out the mallet to smack each one on the head. It shouldn’t be allowed this close to Christmas.
So it was no surprise, but with sinking hearts, that a new report, this time from the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) popped up on our timelines. But before we delve into the mire once more a primer…
What is the IFS?
The Institute for Fiscal Studies is a highly influential independent economic research organisation. This report will be taken seriously by the Government, have no doubt about that. It’s written in a dispassionate way assessing issues and possible solutions as if disabled children are inanimate widgets.
What are the report’s key findings?
The report is entitled “Spending on special educational needs in England: something has to change” Complying with the perfectly good existing law might be the answer, we thought. But no, of course, that is not its conclusion. Legal compliance doesn’t get a look in.
It is a thorough analysis, but there is nothing in this report about the situation in SEND that we don’t already know.
We’ve summarised the key findings here, so read the report to see their exact wording. Direct quotes from the report are indicated as such.
- One: There has been a 71% increase in Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) since 2018, meaning 4.8% of pupils have an EHCP. This is mostly autistic (ASD) children, those with speech, language and communication needs, and those with “social, emotional and mental health needs (including ADHD).”
Calling ADHD an SEMH is incredibly reductive. ADHD is a complex neuro-behavioural condition with no cure and it often co-exists with autism. Many children with ADHD do have mental health needs, as do many neurotypical children, but this is often because of the environment they are in and the demands placed upon them.
The report notes these issues are a global phenomena. There isn’t a lot of research into the “why” of increases in childhood disability generally, but awareness, medical advances in pre-term and neonatal/childhood conditions, and, in England, of increased rights with the Children and Families Act 2014 are among them. This UCL article explores this to some extent.
Doesn’t the Department for Education engage researchers and futurists to look at trends and forecast what might be needed, so societal developments don’t come as head-scratching surprises? But then history seems littered with stories of researchers issuing future warnings that are ignored until disaster is upon us. The very fact of an expansion of entitlement in the CFA should have set planners planning before 2014. The government offered something beneficial, but no one thought to ask, what if it’s actually taken up?
- TWO: While government funding has increased by 59% between 2015 to now, it is lagging behind what is needed considering the EHCP rise.
To us, this is a also governmental planning failure.
“The SEND system has become financially unsustainable over recent years. The number of pupils with SEND, and in particular those with EHCPs, has rocketed since around 2018. As local authorities have a statutory obligation to provide the support set out in each EHCP, but funding has not kept pace with this rise, many face huge deficits in their high-needs budgets. In response, governments have significantly increased funding in recent years…However, these funding rises have not always been sufficient to close in-year deficits, let alone pay down the accumulated high-needs debts.”
IFS report
- THREE: Councils have amounted large deficits because of the CFA’s increased statutory entitlements. The report estimates this at least £3.3 billion.
The statutory override that has staved off council bankruptcies is due to end in March 2026. There is no decision or even a plan as to what do to then. (Again, this seems like a governmental planning failure.)
- FOUR: There is a post-code lottery in having needs identified and in LA funding, indicating a need for, “reform of the funding system to better align with current need, as well as a more uniform approach to SEND identification and support.”
The last bit, to us, means better training and compliance with the law. Doesn’t it?
- FIVE: Special schools have accounted for almost two-thirds of the increase in spending.
The increases between state and independent specialist is the same, at £900 million each, but state special schools educate many more pupils. Independent specialist schools support some of the most complex children for which that the state has no provision.
- SIX: The report claims, “There are financial incentives for schools to seek EHCPs.”
This makes it sound like there is some underhandedness at play, but when schools’ basic SEND funding has significantly eroded in value as it hasn’t been increased for over a decade, they often find they can only get top-up funding with a EHCP.
- SEVEN: The government’s own funding forecasts suggest annual spending on high needs will rise by at least £2–3 billion until 2028, “which largely reflects projected increases in EHCPs and need over the next few years”.
Because EHCPs are statutory documents, the report says if nothing changes LAs will have an £8 billion cumulative deficit by 2027.
And this leads on to the final finding – they saved the worst till last – and it will send a chill through the SEND community.
- EIGHT: “Meaningful reform will be complex and costly, ” requiring a significant expansion of mainstream SEND provision, more state special schools, the core SEND provision available in mainstream schools, an expansion of state-funded special school places, a geographic redistribution of funding, and maybe reducing the statutory obligations currently attached to EHCPs.
We’ll comment more on this later.
“At the moment, there are huge delays in getting assessments, forcing many parents to get private assessments or go to legal tribunals. Building parental confidence in a new system will therefore be challenging. Any transition to a new system would also be costly as it would likely entail some double funding to cover current obligations. Although difficult, substantial reform is necessary to create a financially sustainable and equitable SEND system.”
Widget’s world
And there you have it– another organisation recommending cutting the rights of some of the most vulnerable people in the country. The recognition that this increase in needs is part of a global trend should not mean that we therefore make it harder to get support.
And what would they cut? We have already seen local government calling for the right to appeal a refusal to carry out an EHC needs assessment to be ditched.
But almost all of these refusals are reversed if taken to the SEND Tribunal or before, because they are unlawful decisions. So they would say that, wouldn’t they? If you can’t win fairly, let’s change the rules. We’re in Trump’s world now, wherever you live.
“The number of pupils with EHCPs in mainstream schools has risen sharply from 126,000 in 2017 to 252,000 in 2024. This has likely placed strain on the ability of mainstream schools to cater for pupils with high needs, which could itself have increased parental preference for specialist settings.”
IFS
The report points out that while 99% of children with SEND are in mainstream school (most without EHCPs), the small number in independent special schools (ISS) is what’s costing millions LAs don’t have.
But why do LAs name ISS, albeit usually after an appeal? One reason: because they don’t have suitable provision of their own. When they refuse, it can mean a child is left without education, with their parents forced to appeal and/or home educate (not by choice), or with the LA providing an Education Other Than At School (EOTAS) EHCP package. These numbers are rising fast, and this is where we are going to be seeing even bigger increases if moves to limit legal entitlements go ahead. Is this what the government wants?
Is the increase real or “incentivised”?
“There is no shortage of policy options and it is likely that the government will want to make multiple changes. All of the options are challenging and costly. The ‘right’ option will depend on how much of the rise in EHCPs is due to an objective rise in very high needs among young people or increased recognition of needs, as opposed to financial and legal incentives for less severe needs to be met by the costly statutory system of EHCPs. Both effects are likely to be at play.”
This quote at the top of section four asks how much the increase is from thousands of children with EHCPs who “don’t really need them”. EHCPs are not dished out like sweeties. Ask any parent; it’s a hard road but they are driven by desperation. If you saw your child drowning, wouldn’t you dive in to save them?
In any case, our research shows that LAs initially refuse most applications from parents, though when schools or colleges apply, LAs are more likely to go ahead. Only a small fraction of parents appeal and when they do, they almost always prevail because the Tribunal applies the law. Funny how LAs never complain about the Tribunal when they win.
Additionally, many EHCPs for children in mainstream do not come with additional money. But for parents, it is the statutory nature of the plan, meaning that the provision MUST be provided that’s far more important. If the school feels it needs extra cash to do this, it can apply for top-up funding.
It’s not the actual plan that’s the issue, it’s the fact that when a child needs a certain type of provision that the LA cannot provide itself, it has to opt for more expensive independent schools. EHCPs are the key to funding for specialist provision. The answer must be more specialist schools, not fewer entitlements, surely?
Noting the global phenomena of neurodiversity and mental health needs, the IFS says if the rise is because of greater needs or better identification, “then the best approach is likely to involve expanding current provision to meet that need and finding the best ways to assess how to meet those needs (i.e. specialist versus mainstream provision)”
However, if it’s because of “financial incentives”, to seek EHCPs “for less severe needs”, (presumably by schools) “the statutory obligations attached to EHCPs” (presumably referring to parents), “poor practice” (schools again), and “seemingly artificial separations between high-needs and mainstream education budgets,” then the IFS recommends cost-saving measures and legal/funding reforms.
This makes little sense. If schools are applying for EHCPs it’s because they don’t have the funding to provide what a child needs without it. Isn’t the solution, therefore, to increase the delegated budget so children don’t need an EHCP to meet “less severe needs”.
Where it talks about poor practice, the Government is already offering funded SEND training for schools. It’s vital this is continued long-term—and made mandatory for teachers to complete some element of SEND CPD every year. They should also make SEND integral to teacher training, not just a module.
As to the “artificial separations” funding issue, this can be reformed without making any adjustments to disabled children’s rights. The IFS says “sufficiently expanding core provision to accommodate rising need is likely to require much more” than the £740 million recently announced to improve accessibility –and this is capital, not resourced funding.
What are the IFS’ options?
The IFS offer six options for reform
- ONE: Continue with the current system of pupil-led top-up funding for EHCPs.
The IFS notes this is likely to lead to “… widespread local authority bankruptcies….Continuing with the current system would lead to over 5% of pupils (and rising) going through the costly and combative EHCP assessment system.”
- TWO: Seek to deliver provision in a more cost-effective way, without affecting overall quality.
The IFS claims this is the aim of the safety valve programme, but we can clearly see that this is not what is happening. LAs are finding ways to cut provision.
The rise of Ordinarily Available Provision is likely to be used to place greater hurdles in the way of seeking EHCPs, demanding that schools provide more support than they can afford. This may prevent schools from applying for EHCPs, so more parents will have to take the initiative if provision isn’t available. OAP does not change the law.
Additionally, the IFS seems to think SV is working, when we know a significant number of LAs are not able to meet the terms of their agreements and the Government has halted its expansion. Even the IFS says “…it is hard to believe [SV] are the major element of the solution given the vast rises in numbers and spending.”
- THREE Reform the system so EHCPs no longer create statutory obligations.
“Schools and local authorities would need to make best endeavours to deliver such provision and ration scarce resources. This is the normal way in which public spending and resources are allocated. Furthermore, the present system already includes rationing; it just happens through accessing assessments and legal tribunals. Enabling local authorities and providers to make plans to meet rising needs across the population as a whole may also be a more efficient and equitable way to deliver provision.”
Again, children are humans, not widgets.
The IFS observes that while financially attractive, it “could be incredibly challenging from a political perspective given parents’ lack of trust in the current system to meet their children’s needs”.
You think? This is a terrible idea– does the IFS not realise how much LAs fail to comply with their statutory duties when they have them, let alone whe they don’t? To this point, the IFS observes, “If we had a clear understanding as to exactly why EHCPs need to be attached to statutory obligations in the current system, we might have a better idea of how to reform the system”. Exactly. Maybe if they’d read SNJ before writing this report they might have come up with some different options. We’d ironically ROFL at this suggestion if it wasn’t so completely what LAs want.
The IFS muses, “What would need to change for parents to trust the system to meet their children’s needs without statutory obligations?” Answers on a postcard please to Institute for Fiscal Studies, London.
- FOUR: Provide further specific services to support children, including earlier interventions before problems become more severe and costly.
Ag, that old chestnut, “early intervention”, so easy to say, yet apparently, so hard to provide. This goes back to training, cutting waiting lists for therapy and expanding the specialist workforce–something we have discussed many times before.
The government has already said it aims to provide mental health support in all secondary schools, which is good. But where will they find the counsellors? Perhaps if more children could be supported in schools, more parents now stuck at home would consider retraining. Just a thought.
The report does recognise it’s unclear how much early intervention would save, “…could early intervention really ‘prevent’ the cost of providing for ASD needs?” Not to mention congenital and genetic conditions are lifelong. While some aspects will be helped by quicker action, you can’t “cure” Down’s syndrome or similar conditions with a bit of early input.
- FIVE: Increase capacity in the state-funded specialist sector.
The IFS rightly note that whatever option is chosen, this will be needed. Lack of capacity and lack of the right type of provision is why expensive independent provision is needed. However, it’s imperative that when building more specialist provision, it is of the right kind and in the right place.
- SIX: Deliver more support within mainstream schools
“In many ways, this seems like the most natural option, but this is not simple either. It would be a massive change in what schools do and how they are funded. Schools would need to be able to offer core provision for pupils with a range of different types of SEND, and do so without affecting existing provision…Delivering a core offer is likely to be harder for smaller schools, given that types of needs and costs are likely to be more volatile for them.”
This is along the lines of what the government is already planning, and the findings of the Curriculum and Assessment Review will be important. However, we have previously noted the government’s direction of travel to use more resource bases and units attached to mainstream schools is not inclusion. They need to take more time to consult and think through these plans instead of just hearing something they think is dandy and deciding that’s the thing to do, as seems to be happening.
Slowly does it because “parental confidence”
“One can easily imagine a preferred policy package that involved more state-funded special school places for those with the highest needs and more early intervention services in mainstream schools to make up an expanded core offer for those with less severe needs. In the long run, one could credibly claim that such a system would reduce future spending needs and improve equity. In the short run, however, the transition is likely to pose major challenges. Delivering an expanded core offer is a big change to schools and requires up-front investment in people and buildings, but it is a necessary first step to build parental confidence.”
IFS report
We’ve said it before—so-called “parental confidence” is the result of a well-functioning system, not the cause of it.
The IFS cautions that any reforms must be done slowly, with funding dual systems in transition. Perhaps if the 2014 reforms had done this for longer, more LAs would have had a chance to trial out the new system, feed back issues and work out difficulties.
“This is an expensive and challenging thing to do at a national level. In the end, one must confront powerful arguments and constraints working in opposite directions. On the one hand, the system is clearly in need of urgent, radical change and will push annual spending up by at least £2–3 billion in three years’ time without reform. On the other hand, the public finances are incredibly tight and the likely set of reforms represent controversial, massive changes to the school system. With this in mind, the most important thing the government can do is set out a clear long-term vision.”
That vision must include families and the sector at the heart. And not just to listen and move on, but to work hand-in-hand, outside of their “usual suspects” if they want to broaden their thinking.
What do our SNJ experts think?
We asked our experts for their views…
Matt Keer:
“The IFS specialises in bloodless reports about financial plumbing, and that’s what they’ve produced here. At times, it’s not obvious they’re aware of the impact of this stuff on the lives of children and young people. But it’s unlikely that the IFS has singled out SEND for special treatment here – this is just what they do across all policy areas.
“It also means the IFS’s calls for urgent reform are mostly about how to move money around the SEND system better. It isn’t convinced by the trope that the 2014 SEND reforms were “fundamentally flawed”, or that EHCPs are inherently more attractive than the statements of SEN that preceded them. The IFS doesn’t believe children are being over-diagnosed, and the report states–bluntly and correctly–that early intervention shouldn’t be assumed to be automatically cheaper, given the types of need that have grown most sharply in the last decade.
“Instead, it places more emphasis on other things in the diagnosis: acute pressures on mainstream school budgets; arbitrary financial thresholds, frozen in time for a decade; a crazed patchwork quilt of local funding arrangements; and a lack of specialists to assess and meet need. The six policy options at the back are a mixed bag. One of these options, dilution of children’s rights to statutory support, is poorly framed, and is described as “incredibly challenging from a political perspective.” That’s an understatement, but the IFS has the luxury of not appearing to dabble in politics. Families of children and young people with SEND don’t have that luxury.
“But there’s one clear IFS recommendation that is worth listening to. The researchers say if the government is going to make deep reforms to the SEND system, it can’t just shift funding from the specialist sector to mainstream schools. It’ll have to transition from an old system to a new system. And unlike 2014, the government will have to fund both systems properly during that transition period.”
Catriona Moore:
“Yet another report on SEND that presents children who need extra support as a problem for the taxpayer, rather than asking why so many children and young people with SEND are being failed by a system that should have all the elements in place to support them as the law requires.
“Suggesting one solution may be ‘reducing the statutory obligations currently attached to EHCPs’ is a counsel of despair. Given how many children and young people don’t currently receive the special educational provision and support they are entitled to, reducing their legal rights would be a deeply cynical way of making the system look like it’s working, without addressing any of the reasons why the SEND framework is routinely not adhered to.
“There should be no doubt in anyone’s mind that ‘reducing statutory obligations’ means reducing the number of children and young people who are entitled to support that meets their needs, or reducing the amount of support an individual child or young person can access. Policy-makers need to be absolutely clear about whether they accept that disabled children should receive a proper education in an environment that meets their needs or not. If they think educating disabled children isn’t worth the money it costs, they should be honest and say so.”
Dr Sharon Smith, SNJ Co-Director:
“When my disabled daughter was small, I sat in a training session delivered by an occupational therapist. A parent of a child who has Down syndrome asked why children with the genetic condition do not tend to be provided with OT support, despite the obvious benefits to them. The OT replied that you put your limited resources into the children who are likely to make the greatest level of progress and this does not include those who have Down syndrome. This recommendation from ISF has a similar feel. The right to education should not be on a cost/benefit analysis. This should not be about the allocation of scarce resources in a way that reduces the rights of some children to a suitable education, while maintaining the rights to education for the vast majority, those who have the greatest potential. This option sends shivers down my spine.”
Gill Doherty, SNJ Co-Director:
“When the Institute of Fiscal studies weighs up the risk of local authority bankruptcy against the needs of disabled children and young people it’s not hard to predict which way the scales will tip. However it is hard to read a report that shows such casual disregard for the human cost of proposals that include rationing scarce resources and the removal of disabled children’s rights.
“LAs already routinely fail to meet their legal duties under the current system. Imagine the chaos and conflict that would ensue if the requirement (in the context of inadequate finances and scarce resources) was just to make “best endeavours” to deliver provision, as the report suggests. The report poses a pivotal question: What would need to change for parents to trust the system to meet their children’s needs without statutory obligations? Let’s turn that around: If you’re so confident that a reformed system can meet children’s needs then why are you proposing removing statutory obligations?”
Rachel Filmer:
“The ‘right option’ is what will meet the needs of children. It is disgraceful to frame the legal protection of a statutory plan as “legal incentives” when they admit that non-statutory support has been eroded to almost nothing. What else are parents supposed to do? Needs don’t disappear because you don’t meet them. They worsen and cost more to support as a result.
“Schools not having enough money to meet the needs of children, due to funding decisions taken by the government, is very different from having a “financial incentive”. Schools not being able to access the funding they need to meet childrens’ needs, whether they have a statutory plan or not, is a failure of fiscal policy and priority. Whichever way you look at it, schools can’t afford to meet needs which leads to a rise in off-rolling, use of AP, exclusions and specialist placements. And again, all of these issues listed are choices made at government level, not inevitabilities.
“Removing statutory plans will not improve equity. Equity is about getting what you need, not ensuring everyone gets the same. More maintained specialist provision, more support for mainstream schools to meet needs where this is suitable, more creative thinking in terms of what education looks like would mean more equity. Changing the law and calling it equity is offensive. The report asks, “What would need to change for parents to trust the system to meet their children’s needs without statutory obligations?” Even if you could meet a child’s needs for years without statutory obligations, we will never trust the system to maintain that support in future. Parents, families and campaigners will never accept this. We cannot state this strongly enough.”
Don’t blame the crisis on parents and disabled children
None of this is the fault of the child with SEND or their family. Yet it is they who will face reduced rights and even less education if the government makes legislative changes to narrow entitlements. It is clear that the fault lies with lack of government foresight, that has led to a lack of timely funding, that has left local authorities stuck in the middle. LAs don’t think the government will pay, so reducing rights is lower-hanging fruit. But it is the wrong road to go down.
There is never difficulty finding money when the government wants to. Fund SEN Support, ringfence it, give children the right to access it when needed. Make teaching an attractive option. Make academies accountable. Create mainstream schools that work for neurodivergent children and enough state specialist provision for those who need it. Legislate to ban for-profit independent special provision if necessary. A Labour government should be protecting rights for vulnerable people, not removing their rights.
Also read:
- Researching flexi-schooling: How beneficial is it for children with SEND?
- Oops, we did it again… The Government must now listen to more than 100,000 people who do not want to lose SEND rights
- Experts at Hand: When is an occupational therapist also a SEND expert?
- Could using AI to filter Government consultation responses lead to “algorithmic silencing” of neurodivergent voices?
- A council’s “improvement journey”? How determined SEND parents catalogued the trail of their LA’s unlawful behaviour
- Research: Social networks in special schools. Friendships, bullying and play
- CrowdJustice SEND accountability: When the law says “must”, local authorities cannot treat it as “maybe”
- DfE must give its SEND reform Child Rights Impact Assessment a do-over; this time, without marking its own homework
- Research: SEND case officers are LAs’ “human shield” gatekeepers. But parents shouldn’t have to be their own key workers
What kind of government is “bold” enough to scrap statutory EHCPs from vulnerable children?May 16, 2025
The SEND reforms in the Schools White Paper reveal rights given, and rights stripped awayFebruary 24, 2026
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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
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