Miss Smith, my Year 3 teacher, gazed out of the window and sighed, drumming her fingers on the carton of cigarettes which sat openly on her desk.

In 1982 teachers did not take kindly to unexpected meetings with parents on a Wednesday evening. My mother, a teacher herself, was unperturbed and wanted to know why my spelling and reading had fallen so far behind my peers. I’d had the extra practice cards which the school had sent home (in a Swan Vesta tin). It wasn’t as though she didn’t practice with me – we’d spent more time with Janet and John than either of us wanted.

I sat next to her, also wishing I was now at home – or better still out in the street playing with my mates.

Miss Smith decided to address the matter in her usual forthright and direct manner.

‘If I’m honest Mrs Botten, I think Simon is just a bit thick…’

“To define the future, one must study the past” Confucius.

Inclusion practice in primary schools in the 1980s was light-years ahead of the 1950’s (when my Grandfather taught in inner-city Sheffield schools), but light-years behind where we are now. The teacher’s comment, whilst cruel and shocking by today’s standard, was simply a reflection of the fatalism of the time – some children succeeded at school and some didn’t, that was just the way of things.

I mention this story both because, as an Executive Headteacher and soon-to-be-author I find the tale personally validating, but also because it shows us where we have travelled from in terms of societal and pedagogical understanding in just forty years, and what the next strides forward may look like in the next few decades. It illustrates that, whilst we may think that practice is settled and static, it is always evolving: sometimes gradually, but more often in fits and starts.

And whilst inclusion in schools continues to improve, we stand at a point in time where the system in place to support children with Special Educational Needs or Disabilities (SEND) is on the verge of collapse as a result of ballooning demand for support and dwindling financial resources. It feels as though we are standing on the verge of another watershed moment which will define inclusion practice for the next decade.

We need to talk about SEND.

And in order to move practice forwards, the system, schools and society have some big questions which need answering in the near future if we are to provide the support which young people need if they are to grow into successful, independent adults, able to thrive within society. I am aware that this topic elicits very strong feelings so I will attempt to walk a tight-rope between provoking thought and provoking ire.

So, as someone who is by no means an expert in this field, but who does have some experience, here are three questions which we need to answer, and five actions which could (in my humble opinion) begin to improve a creaking system.

Three questions about SEND.

1. What does the term ‘Special Educational Needs or Disabilities’ mean in 2025?

The number of EHCPs, in England, has increased by 70% in the last four years. The annual cost of SEND provision is currently ten billion pounds per year. A study by Bristol University concluded that nearly half of children in Wales are on the SEND register, with the percentage in England not far behind (39% according to the National Audit Office).

The term SEND is defined in the Children and Families Act 2014 as ‘a learning difficulty or disability that makes it harder for a child or young person to learn than others their age’. The SEND Code of Practice notes that a child should only be placed on the SEND register (prompting further support and investigation) if they have ‘significant difficulties learning compared to their peers, or a disability that hinders their access to education’.

Whilst the guidance contained within the SEND Code of Practice is useful, it is interpreted very differently by different schools and settings. The Bristol study also noted that children in receipt of Free School Meals were five times more likely to be on the SEND register so it is also clear that disadvantage is sometimes being categorised as SEND. Overall, the rapid increase in the number of children now being placed on the SEND register in the last decade or so suggests that we, as a system, need to come to a clearer consensus on what it means to be categorised as having a SEND in 2025.

2. Why are EHCPs increasing so rapidly?

As mentioned above, the 70% increase in EHCPs in the last four years is a significant change. Whilst some improvements in diagnosis, especially around neurodiversity, could account for some of this increase, something else must be happening within the system to drive this acceleration.

If there are more children with greater need in the system then an increase of this magnitude would surely prompt urgent analysis and investigation as it suggests that more children have more needs than a decade ago. However, if the majority of this rise is driven by factors within the system itself, which is equally possible, then this also needs some urgent investigation.

Either way, we need to be more curious as to why this increase has occurred, and what factors are driving it.

3. Which children should have EHCPs/ bespoke support and how should this be funded?

Linked to the question above is a very real, if uncomfortable, question around what level of need should quality for funded support (such as the current EHCP system), where the threshold for funded bespoke support should be and how we should fund and organise this support when it is provided. There is also the question around when specialist settings should be considered for a young person and, again, how should this be commissioned and funded.

This is very much a political hot potato, and I understand why parents are nervous of the government’s desire for reform which they view as a cost cutting exercise. But it is clear that this current system isn’t working and is riddled with inequalities and inconsistency.

This needs to be urgently reviewed if provision is to improve.

And five suggestions.

As I said, there are people far wiser than me who will have better suggestions than I, but as a starting point, I think we need to consider the following:

1. We need a grown up debate about what constitutes additional need in 2025.

We need a grown-up debate about what we actually want for children who present with SEND either short or long-term and also what schools primary role is in supporting them.

We can look back on how inclusion was organised in the 1980’s and see that, by modern standards, it was uncaring and, at times, inflexible. However, we need to ask serious questions about what we currently want for our young people, as, particularly in the last few post-Covid years, we may run the risk of not putting their long-term success first when making decisions about their provision or future potential in the here and now. Just as the off-hand remark made by Miss Smith, my Year 4 teacher in 1983, implied an limited view of young Simon’s potential, we must be careful not to organise provision which strips children with the opportunity to grow into the best version of themselves. Most would agree that we want children who grow into adults who can lead productive and happy independent lives. However, the system, and sometimes an increasing cultural narrative of need as opposed to latent potential, is poor at keeping this goal fixed in the minds of schools and parents. Our desire to be kind in the moment, may result in us inadvertently being unkind to the child’s future potential.

Schools are places of learning and socialisation. Teachers must not allow unconscious biases to lower our expectations of what all pupils can achieve with the right support. We must be brave enough to resist calls to provide support which may actually limit progress by creating dependency. We must resist the urge to apply ‘one size fits all’ labels prematurely which drive provision which may be unnecessary or incorrect.

2. We need to create more slack in the universal system so that more children can be supported routinely in schools

More money needs to be spent further up-stream in the education system to routinely support children in schools so that less money needs to be spent on bespoke funded plans. Whilst there will always be a proportion of children needing such plans (currently EHCPs), better early and ongoing universal support would reduce the need to issue plans at the current rate.

However, this can’t happen for free (as successive governments have tried to maintain). We need new money to provide a system which isn’t constantly running at 100% of capacity, which currently results in no available support being available as it is always being used elsewhere. There is an extraordinary amount of money currently spent on SEND within the English education system and if we stop wasting a huge amount of it on private schooling (more on this later), then this money may indeed be available within current national budgets.

But schools need to have some flex to provide support within their existing universal provision if we are to reduce the need for so many costly individual plans.

3. We need to commission more LA or Academy-run specialist provision

Some children do need specialist provision either within ‘Resourced Provision’ within mainstream schools, which is an effective and cost-effective model, or in special schools which can provide highly-specialist support at scale.

Why we are spending £60,000 PA per pupil (plus £15,000 PA for transport) to send them to private schools (of varying quality), when a better-quality and more local LA or Academy-run school could do this at a fraction of the cost, is beyond me.

I suspect it is down to something as ridiculous as council capital budgets (which can’t flex) verses High Needs budgets for EHCPs (which can).

Either way, this should be something which is possible to resolve.

4. We need to phase out EHCPs and come up with a better system

I think we have passed the point of no return for EHCPs. I think we should protect those already issued, but, just as we did with ‘Statements of SEND’ which came before them, phase them out and come up with a better way to meet the needs of children with complex barriers or disabilities.

This would require complete reform of the legal and operational structures which have led to the current impasse.

I have no idea how to do this or what a new system should look like.

I do think that time-limited funding for support earlier in a child’s educational journey, may reduce the need for some (although not all) longer-term and costly support which is currently the default in the EHCP system.

Thankfully, that is for someone wiser than I to decide.

5. Every child needs an advocate.

As a child who under-performed academically at school in the 80’s, my future could have been very different had the ‘normal’ wisdoms of the era been prevalent. However, my mother had no interest in labels or SEND registers. She knew that without good basic skills I would struggle in life and therefore she did all in her power to ensure that, difficulties notwithstanding, I could grow into the best version of myself. And whilst I’m very aware that my needs were mild given the current spectrum, I do know that having someone in my corner, assuming that I would eventually prevail (both academically as well as socially), had a massive impact on my self-perception.

I worry that, forty years later and in a far superior system, not every child has someone in school who will fight, not just for (the right) support in the here and now, but for their independent and resilient future. Who will sometimes push that young person to do things which they don’t, in the here and now, feel capable of. Who doesn’t rely on the lazy shorthand of labels and norm-referencing to guide what they believe that child is capable of.

Because that gift costs nothing.