Earlier this week, we jointly hosted a webinar with SEND legal charity, SOS!SEN on the implications for children’s legal rights to EHCPs and EOTAS of the Government’s SEND proposals. And, as if by magic, here is the recording. This does not only concern those with out of school provision, but every child and young person with an EHCP, of who might need one in the future.
SNJ Co-Director, Dr Sharon Smith chaired the discussion that heard from four experts in EOTAS – just the kind of people the Government should have spoken to about the issue before they hacked together their inept proposals.
From SOS!SEN, panellists were solicitor Eleanor Wright, the charity’s legal officer, and Megan Booth, its EOTAS adviser, who is also a parent of young people with EOTAS packages. Another panellist was Marsha Martin, also the parent of a child with EOTAS and the CEO of Black SEN Mamas, an 8,000 strong community of families. The fourth panellist was Joanna Gibbs, CEO of SENsational Tutors, an online provider of education. All four expertly responded to Sharon’s questions and to questions from the hundreds of parents in attendance.
We’ll try to get some shorter clips for you during the day, but you can watch the whole thing below, or listen to the audio on Spotify. If you prefer, we have also uploaded the transcript, which you can find as a pdf here.
The links mentioned in the webinar
You can find all the links we mentioned in the webinar on our SEND Politics page
Find it as a podcast
YouTube | Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Amazon Music
Find the podcast version on Spotify here. It will be available on the above platforms during the day.
Watch the recording
To make a small donation to help us do more webinars, click here.
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Key Content
Also read:
- The government must not ignore stark warnings about lack of mainstream SEND capacity reported by its own research
- What makes an autism assessment report genuinely useful to a school?
- Big ideas belong to everyone: Education, rights and lifelong learning for people with learning disabilities
- As The Guardian prints our joint campaign’s open letter, it’s clear people with lived experience don’t want to lose SEND rights
- How do you ensure pathways to education, health, and social care support, meet both diagnosis and needs?
- 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”
- Researching flexi-schooling: How beneficial is it for children with SEND?
- EOTAS: Why the Government must listen to those with lived experience
- The Unacceptable Truth: 20 SEND legal rights at risk from the Government’s SEND reforms
- WEBINAR RECORDING! The implications for children’s legal rights to EHCPs and EOTAS of the Government’s SEND proposals
- Unison voices major concerns over SEND reform health plans for sick and disabled children out of school in the EOTAS consultation
- Top Tips for the EOTAS & EHCP consultation: Protect your child’s rights to statutory SEND support
- What might the SEND reform proposals mean for specialist tutors, alternative provision and EOTAS?
- When Home-to-School Transport Doesn’t Fit: The Reality of Section 19 EOTAS
- EOTAS Consultation: A further assault on children’s SEND rights with cost saving and reintegration to schools at its heart
- SEND reforms: Where are care-experienced children?
- Part 2: The Invisible Lifeline: Why EOTAS is Non-Negotiable for the ‘Sanctuary Cohort’
- The Invisible Lifeline: Why EOTAS is non-negotiable for the ‘Sanctuary Cohort’ Part 1
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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- What makes an autism assessment report genuinely useful to a school? - October 14, 2026
- Big ideas belong to everyone: Education, rights and lifelong learning for people with learning disabilities - October 12, 2026
- As The Guardian prints our joint campaign’s open letter, it’s clear people with lived experience don’t want to lose SEND rights - October 9, 2026
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