Examination of witnesses (Questions 1
- 19)
WEDNESDAY 22 JULY 1998
MR GORDON
TOPPING, MR
JOHN MCCULLOUGH,
MR JOSEPH
MARTIN, MR
JACKIE FITZSIMONS
and MRS HELEN
MCCLENAGHAN
Chairman
1. You are most welcome. The labels which
have the names on your side also have labels on our side, so we
are able to identify all of you. In line with our normal practice,
we will ask questions from different corners of the horseshoe,
because we will try to make sure that the questions follow a logical
pattern. It may well be, either during the examination or, indeed,
in writing afterwards, you might wish to gloss something that
you had said, if you felt that it had not been entirely clear,
and we might well wish to follow up with some more written questions
after the event is over. I do not know whether there is anything
you would like to say, either individually or collectively, before
we start? I should advise the hearing that we are quite likely
to have a Division in the fairly near future, at which point we
will simply suspend temporarily. Mr Topping, I gather you are
in the role of overseer, or co-ordinator?
(Mr Topping) Thank you very much, Chairman. Yes,
for my sins, I am afraid, I have got the position of trying to
co-ordinate what goes on. And could I say thank you, Chairman,
for the invitation, and thank you to the Members for inviting
us here; we are particularly pleased to be here to assist the
Committee in its deliberations. We would like to make, I think,
maybe a few initial remarks, Chairman, if that is okay.
2. Of course.
(Mr Topping) First of all, we are very grateful
for your introduction. The provision of special education for
children with special educational needs is perhaps one of the
most difficult, sensitive and, even, at times, heart-rending responsibilities
which we in the Boards have to fulfil. It often requires a delicate
balance between the wishes of parents, the individual needs of
children and the limited resources that are available. Our role
is to make the best possible, high quality provision which contributes
to the enhancement of children's learning and meets their educational
needs. The area of identification, assessment and making provision
for those with special educational needs is a complex, dynamic
and, we would argue, I think, evolving area, requiring flexible
responses and a range of provision throughout a continuum of need.
We are justly proud, Chairman, of the special education facilities
we provide, and we welcome the Committee's interest in this subject,
which we believe will contribute to the enhancement of our services.
I think it is timely, too, Chairman, to take stock of what we
have achieved over the last ten years, because we are moving from
the framework that was established by the 1986 Order to one based
on the 1996 Order, and that establishes, through a Code of Practice,
the best practice over the intervening decade. And our responses,
I hope, to your questions, Chairman, and to your inquiry, will
be to concentrate, first of all, on how we have worked over the
last ten years and what we have achieved, and also then to show
you how we hope to comply, or how we have actually planned to
comply, with the 1996 Order and the Code of Practice.
3. Thank you very much indeed. Let me start.
I detect some difficulty in comparing the cost of different types
of provision for pupils with special educational needs. Is there
any mechanism whereby the cost of alternative placements at special
schools, special units and mainstream schools for pupils with
similar educational needs can be compared?
(Mr Topping) Thank you, Chairman. I think Mr Martin
is going to take the financial aspects.
(Mr Martin) Chairman, the situation, by and large,
is that the unit cost for children with moderate learning difficulties
who are educated in special schools, and we are talking here about
statemented pupils, is in the region of £5,000; for pupils
with severe learning difficulties, it is closer to £8,000
to £9,000. There are also some units which are provided for
children who are statemented and the cost per pupil there is in
the region of £4,500 to £5,000. So, in regard to pupils
with moderate learning difficulties, there is not a significant
difference between those who are educated in special schools and
those educated in special units. But we are talking now about
the 2 per cent of pupils with special difficulties who have statements.
(Mr Topping) Chairman, can I make just a general
point, too, in relation to that question. I think that, when you
look at the 1986 Order, there is a particular philosophy behind
that, and the philosophy is that the individual needs of individual
children need to be assessed and need to be identified and then
the provision needs to be made to meet those needs. I think that
means that every single individual child is special and needs
to be treated specially. And, therefore, when you come to costing
individual needs, undoubtedly there will be a disparity and there
will be difference, because we are not categorising children,
we are looking at them as individuals. The 1996 Order though,
and the Code of Practice, changes that; it starts to group children
into various categories and, at that stage, I think it will be
easier for us to be able to say "this child falls into this
particular group", and therefore we can compare costs much
more easily.
4. I will be guided by you, Mr Topping,
if individual colleagues want to come in?
(Mr Fitzsimons) Mr Chairman, I think, also, while
you will have the categories, you will have to be mindful that
there will be different degrees of disability, and Mr Topping
is right in saying that we will have to make provision for the
individual needs of children. And the great danger is that we
will be inclined to look purely at a financial barometer for measuring
the efficiency and effectiveness of provision, and what we are
anxious about is that there is progression in the development
of these children. We could easily establish a figure which would
be attributable to a particular child, but I think what we have
got to be mindful of is that we are interested not just in equity
of treatment but in equality of opportunity for these children.
Not all these children start from the same base, and therefore
the amount of money that has to be spent on each child will be
determined by the progress that child makes and the sources of
help and assistance that that child will need, to respond.
5. There is no obligation on everybody to
answer, indeed I do not think we would get through the hearing
if we did, and to some extent you may already have answered the
question I am about to ask, but do your Boards have any mechanisms
in place which ensure the equitable allocation of resources to
pupils with similar needs, either within your individual Boards
or, indeed, collectively, across the Boards as a whole?
(Mr Martin) The mechanism that we have is regular
meetings between the designated officers of the Boards with responsibility
for special needs and they try to agree mechanisms for assessing
pupils to ensure that there is a certain level of provision which
is fair for pupils with similar types of needs. But, as Mr Topping
and Mr Fitzsimons said, the needs are so different; even within
physical disabilities, there are different levels of disability,
there may be different levels and different kinds of therapy,
and we go on the professional advice of the medical, the paramedical
and the psychological services, to try to ensure, as far as possible,
that the individual needs are met. We are satisfied that there
is equity of treatment and that the same type of category of difficulty
receives more or less the same type of support.
(Mrs McClenaghan) Chairman, I would make reference
also to the fact that children who are in units at mainstream
schools are allocated funds under the LMS scheme for schools,
and there is obviously a great deal of commonality, at the moment,
there is a working party on the whole issue of Local Management
of Schools and of its funding, and there is one group reporting
to that which is particularly looking at the funding of children
in units, and indeed the units themselves, with a view to uniformity.
So considerable progress is being made on the funding of children
within units.
(Mr Fitzsimons) There also is an issue of the
commonality. A major cost is the staffing of schools, particularly
MLD schools and SLD schools and special units. The issue of staffing
is a major cost in any provision; it varies between 80 and 90
per cent of a total budget. There is guidance provided by the
Department of Education, as applied by the Boards, about pupil/teacher
ratios in MLD and SLD schools, and, by and large, that staffing
would be uniform across schools and bands. So there is a commonality
across there and there is an opportunity for Boards to examine
those costs. But the difficulty which arises is really about the
cost of teachers, and we are aware that the age profile of teachers
determines cost; also the age of and design of buildings, or the
units, which are in use. We have some old buildings and we have
children in schools with temporary accommodation, and obviously
the cost of maintenance and running costs of these are substantially
higher than for more modern buildings. But there would be common
figures there. So we do compare and we do rationalise provision
where we find there is an overprovision. For example, the Belfast
Board and the South Eastern Board are now looking to make joint
provision for SLD children.
(Mr McCullough) Chairman, it might be helpful
for Members to be aware that, in England and Wales currently,
in special schools and special provision, there is full-blown
Local Management of Schools, whereas in Northern Ireland there
is not; so we are not actually operating in the same way, so that
a child is worth an amount of money in A, B or C, we are operating
on the distribution of funding the way we have been doing it historically,
in other words, the cost of the placement was met for the child,
wherever that may be. So we are not quite in the same situation
as England and Wales, where you can compare, because an amount
of money is actually given out on the child's head, we actually
meet the full cost, whatever that is, wherever it is.
Mr Beggs
6. Good afternoon, Mrs McClenaghan and gentlemen.
One of the main means of evaluating effectiveness of provision,
as indicated by all the Education and Library Boards, is monitoring
the annual reviews of statemented pupils. The Northern Ireland
Audit Office examination of these reports indicated that in only
approximately one-third of reviews was there adequate information
to assess the effectiveness of provision or set clear objectives
for the future. Would the delegation like to comment on how they
actually monitor the system?
(Mr Topping) Chairman, could I make maybe an initial
remark just about the Audit Report, because we are aware that
the draft Audit Report is in circulation. We would want to make
maybe two points. First of all, we are in the process of commenting
on the Audit Report, and there are certain factual aspects to
the Audit Report which are unclear to us. We are also in the process
of commenting on the recommendations of the Audit Report, because
we are not quite clear what some of those recommendations actually
mean when they are put into practice on the ground. So, in that
context, could we maybe take Mr Beggs's questions, and I think
Mr Fitzsimons will deal with evaluation.
(Mr Fitzsimons) Mr Chairman, obviously, any review
can be improved on, and, certainly, the Code of Practice will
require much clearer objectives and targets, and that will be
helpful. But I think we have got to realise that annual reviews
are examined by Boards with a view to ensuring that the provision
which is made for children is adequate. Parents are consulted
on that; the health authorities are consulted; professionals look
at the proposals. I have had the opportunity of visiting SLD schools
and MLD schools, and looking at the education plans which teachers
have for individual children. In SLD schools, the plans are very,
very detailed and note very small elements of progress and set
targets for improvement, and the same applies in the MLD schools.
This type of practice, I think, could be delivered in mainstream
schools. Also, evaluation is carried out by the Education and
Training Inspectorate, in that they visit schools, they look at
the provision and look at the quality of provision that is made
for children, and their reports are studied carefully. The Boards
of Governors of schools also have an obligation to monitor that
provision, and, indeed, in the future, there will be a requirement,
through the Code, for the special education policy for each school
to be published, and also an identification of the resources which
are attributed to special education within mainstream schools
are also identified, so that parents and everyone can realise
how money has been spent and what the objectives are for the expansion
of those resources. So there will be, hopefully, an improvement
in the format of the annual review and the amount of information
which is given there, more clear targets and objectives, building
on good practice in special schools, and, also, in mainstream.
There will be greater attention given to target-setting and a
transparency in the expenditure of special education funds for
children who have special needs in those schools.
(Mr Martin) Chairman, I wish to reinforce what
Mr Fitzsimons was saying and to address the question directly.
The Audit Report was drawn up about two years ago. Significant
improvements have taken place since then, but the key point is
that that issue will be addressed completely by the Code of Practice,
which takes effect from 1 September, and all schools will be obliged
to provide the details of the information that Mr Beggs described
as inadequate, to some extent, at the present time.
7. I think probably it would be helpful,
Chairman, when the response to the Report is completed, if we,
in turn, were advised of the responses being made. Could I finally
then simply ask, since all the Boards are monitoring, what follow-up
is there to the monitoring process when it has been completed
annually?
(Mr Fitzsimons) On an individual basis, obviously,
an annual review is to examine whether, in fact, the provision
that has been made for a child is adequate or not. The education
officer, or the designated officer, examines every one of those
reviews, reviews the statement, takes account of evidence that
has come from Health and Social Services, takes account of parents'
views and teachers' views, and the statement may be modified in
order to ensure that there is good progress and the support is
sufficient to meet the child's needs. Boards are now looking at
and trying to get some bench-marks of comparisons between schools,
and seeing if there are efficiencies required; if there is a better
way of making provision, then the Boards will do that.
Mr McWalter: Good
afternoon. The Chair has been kind enough to let me in early,
because I cannot be with you for the full session, so I must apologise
for that in advance. I would like to ask about children with emotional
and behavioural difficulties, and really the responses we have
got seem, in many ways, to be very different. The response from
Western, for instance, suggests that the majority of all children
with special educational needs will have their needs addressed
by their school from within its own resources, and maybe, somewhere
or other, it will finally get through to the Board, that, who
knows quite when, or, indeed, we have got a fair indication that
a relatively low proportion of cases, I think, would ever get
any kind of Board attention, or, of course, any kind of more formal
statement. When I look at South Eastern's remarks, they say: "In
the case of a pupil with, for example, emotional and behaviour
difficulties, the Board, in conjunction with the school, would
attempt a number of strategies to deal with the problem",
etc., etc., so there seems to be a more proactive role for the
Board and a clearer understanding, perhaps, of what the team that
is trying to provide the diagnosis, or the prognosis, for the
child might be. So those are two different perspectives. The third
perspective came from the Belfast Board, which, I must confess,
I found quite difficult, and our adviser suggested this was an
appropriate question to ask. I might refer you, on the Belfast
submission, to, it is submission 8a, page 4, where it seems to
go hither and thither. The final complete paragraph, on page 4,
the long complete paragraph, says that, basically, "Definitions
and categories are usually of little relevance." And then
points out that there are some areas, like Attention Deficit Hyperactive
Disorder and Autistic Spectrum Disorders, and, I think, there
are particularly things like Asperger's syndrome, which, of course,
are relatively recent, in terms of their diagnosis, where it really
is very important that you make a diagnosis, that you have a definition,
that you have a clear understanding. Which is one reason why I
prefer the approach of South Eastern to Western, because it is
involving a higher level of expertise than just the school itself.
So I understand the need for that. But Belfast go on to say, well,
okay, that can happen, but, usually, effectively, definitions
and categories are usually of little relevance; and then they
finally conclude: "It appears that the number of children
with emotional and behavioural difficulties will always be at
least as large as the number of children for whom special provision
can be made." If I may summarise this, it seems to me, South
Eastern, to my mind, seem to have got it right, but I would like
to know how the Board gets involved and how it makes its prognosis
about what needs to be done? I think Western have not availed
themselves of the expertise that should be available, and Belfast
is extremely confused. Would you like to comment?
Chairman: I should
make clear, there is no edge to this remark from my colleague.
All individual members of the Committee must speak on behalf of
themselves, as individuals.
Mr McWalter
8. Of course.
(Mr Topping) Thank you, Chairman, for that clarification.
Mr Chairman, can I make a few general points maybe first of all,
and then, obviously, I think the Belfast Board representative,
Mr McCullough, would maybe want to respond to that, I am sure.
First of all, I think we all recognise that emotional and behavioural
difficulties with children is an increasing problem and a very
serious problem in schools, because the 1 or 2 per cent who may
have these difficulties in a school can create a major problem
for educating the rest of the children. So I think that is the
first point I want to make, that we do recognise it as a problem.
Secondly, we are already in the process of tackling this, in a
variety of ways, through a variety of mechanisms, and some of
them we have described in the papers we have presented. The most
recent one, of course, is through the School Improvement Programme,
where a particular element of the School Improvement Programme
is to improve the discipline in schools, and part of that is obviously
to tackle children who have emotional and behavioural difficulties;
but I think we do recognise it and we are taking the issue seriously.
Now, as far as the specific points that Mr McWalter mentioned,
maybe Mr McCullough could take those on.
9. I would like others to comment as well,
because obviously there are other issues?
(Mr McCullough) Chairman, if I could pick up the
two points—there are two points really—in regard to
categorisation and emotional and behavioural difficulties, if
I can move to categorisations, first of all. Members will probably
be aware that, before the 1986 Order, and we are talking of the
1986 Education Order in Northern Ireland, children were categorised
into nine categories of handicap; with the arrival of the 1986
Order, we moved away from categorisation because categorisation
was seen as being a sensitive area, you were actually categorising
children as being handicapped in one of these particular areas,
and we moved towards identification of need and provision to need.
Now, at a later stage, through formula funding, we have moved,
you certainly in England and Wales have moved, back to categorisation,
we have not received that yet in Northern Ireland, but the 1996
Order has moved again to categorisation, under eight categories,
and they are at the back of the Code of Practice. Categories can
be useful and, at the same time, they can be rather superficial,
because, when a child is presenting us with a variety of difficulties,
if we are categorising a child as having one difficulty, we might
well tend to, and indeed the other providers might well tend to,
ignore the other difficulties, but provision of funding tends
to go with the major handicap, major difficulty, and then the
other elements are picked up in some other way. So, with categorisation,
we have to be careful that it does not blind us to the child's
needs, but, at the same time, and Mr McWalter is right, it is
good, in many cases, to categorise, because some children only
get provision when a category is produced and a name is produced
for that particular difficulty or particular disability, and I
have mentioned some of them. There are provisions now for children
with ADHD, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder; children
who previously were in the population but untreated, but now,
because of the way they are presenting and because a name is put
on it, on the disorder, provision is made and health services
are able to provide things like Ritalin to equip the child to
cope in school situations. So there are fors and against, in regard
to categorisation. If I could move to emotional and behavioural
difficulties, what I was actually saying was that there is a dynamic
in the system, in regard to emotional and behavioural difficulties,
there seems to be always a demand for more provision; when more
provision is produced it is filled very quickly, and there is
a continuing demand for provision. So, in some ways, there is
a relationship between the amount of provision you make and the
number of children with emotional and behavioural difficulties,
because, in some ways, when there is a level of provision, schools
cope with very many of the problems, but there is always an overspill.
If I can give examples within our Education and Library Board,
nine years ago, we did not make provision for children with emotional
and behavioural difficulties when they were in primary school.
The teachers in the mainstream schools made that provision themselves.
Since then, over a period of nine years, we have provision in
a special school, in a special unit and support provision for
teachers in mainstream schools, up to 70 pupils across all of
those provisions; all of it has been filled and we require more
provision. That is what I mean when I say that whatever you provide
is going to be filled. You will also note that the spirit of the
legislation is integration, and if we keep providing more and
more segregated provision for children with behavioural difficulties
we are working against the spirit of integration. There are some
children who do have major problems and who have always been provided
for outside of the mainstream system, children who have emotional
and behavioural difficulties, there are other children who have
lesser difficulties, and I have sometimes described this as the
difference between the child who can control himself, and I say
himself because 75 per cent of the incidence is with boys, children
who can control themselves but choose not to, as against the child
who cannot control himself. There is a vast difference. Mainstream
schools used to make provision for the former category and special
schools made provision for the latter category. But there is a
continuum, there is a range of provision, from provision that
can be made, in regard to some of the other submissions, in mainstream
schools by mainstream teachers who improve their skills in regard
to handling youngsters who have behaviour problems, to support
that can come in to the school from the Board. And support is
being developed in all of the Boards, from inreach into schools,
to removal, to short-term provision outside of schools, or removal
to longer-term provision for children who have substantial difficulties,
and there are, unfortunately, a considerable number of children
in the system who do have substantial difficulties.
(Mr Topping) Chairman, does Mr McWalter maybe
want us to run through what provision we have in each of our Boards,
or will that general comment, and the general remarks, I think,
that Mr McCullough has made, which most of us would be agreeing
with and would have the similar kind of provision in-school, short
term and longer term, would that be a satisfactory response?
10. I think that is a start, but there are
some other elements to my question, I think, which other members
of the Boards could perhaps comment on?
(Mr Topping) You would like us to run through;
okay. Maybe we should start then with Mr Martin and just work
our way across.
11. Defend themselves a bit?
(Mr Martin) I hope I have got this correct, and,
if I have not, no doubt Mr McWalter will correct me, but I think
what you quoted in relation to the Western Board was the phrase,
which is in our document, that the needs of the vast majority
of these pupils, that is the 20 per cent who have particular difficulties,
are expected to be met by mainstream schools from within their
own resources. But further up on that page, you will see that
among the services that we provide are outreach support for pupils
with emotional and behavioural difficulties; it is the third point
on the top of that page.
12. My pages are not numbered.
(Mr Martin) I am sorry, it is the third page of
our written answer, and the third point at the top of the page.
13. Yes.
(Mr Martin) "Outreach support for pupils
with emotional and behavioural difficulties"; in fact, we
have 12 outreach teachers; eight of those are based in Derry,
in two units there, and the others are based in special schools
throughout the Board's area, so we have coverage for the whole
of the area. And, as well as that, we have two designated officers
within the Curriculum Advisory and Support Service, whose particular
remit is emotional and behavioural difficulties. So I think that
is the short answer.
14. So they report directly to the Board,
and so the Board is implicated in provision?
(Mr Martin) Absolutely; this is Board provision,
they are placed in special schools but responsible to the Board,
and guidelines are provided for them by the Board.
15. Do you find 12 is enough, given the
observation, which I agree with, that this is an increasing problem?
(Mr Martin) Through you, Chairman, I would never
say that this is enough; no. Indeed, one of the areas that has
been identified in the Department of Education's School Improvement
Programme is behavioural difficulties. There are a number of areas
targeted; this is one of them, and the intention is that there
will be more support provided in this area because it is an increasing
problem. What exactly the optimum provision would be, I could
not say, but certainly we have made a start. Of course, if there
were more money available, it is an increasingly difficult area
and we would want to put more resources there.
16. Then, through you, Chair, insofar as
it is not enough, schools are still very much thrown back on their
own resources to address the problem, so that flavour conveys
through, even so?
(Mr Martin) I do not think so, because one of
the things that all the Boards are doing, particularly in relation
to the Code of Practice, is mounting a major programme of training.
But it is not just training and then leaving people to their own
devices and their own resources; it is trying to support them
after the training. There has been a tremendous amount of co-operation
and collaboration between the support services of the Boards and
the schools, so that schools are not left to their own resources.
And, particularly in relation to Stage 3 of the Code of Practice,
we are developing a range of support services there which will
not leave the schools to their own devices but will help them,
as appropriate. And again, different schools have different levels
of need; some of them are highly developed, others are less developed,
and we are trying to meet them at their point of need.
(Mrs McClenaghan) Chairman, I would like to describe
briefly the situation in my Board and then to bring out the regional
dimension. First of all, we are the sole Board which has a boarding
facility, a school specifically for EBD pupils; now that is a
regional provision. As it happens, the Audit Office, I think,
failed to recognise it was a boarding establishment, and so, when
they cited our costs as being considerably greater than that of
what they believed was a comparable school in South Eastern Board,
the boarding obviously added to the costs, in our case. But it
is a five-Board facility, the school is known as Fallowfield.
Our own views would be that we would like to test out two options,
with a view to recommending them to schools. Three years ago,
we established what is called the Kinego Centre. It is a facility
for eight local secondary schools and they are entitled to a certain
number of places at that school. It is on the understanding that
when the staff at the school and the teachers in the transferring
school are in agreement then those children will move back to
their original secondary school, and so the time span can range
from as little as a month, or five weeks, through to about six
months, but it is not, by any means, a permanent arrangement for
those children. It is generally regarded as being progressive,
and we would like to develop it, including into the primary sector.
Now Mr McWalter did mention the School Improvement Programme,
and this is very important for Boards, and I would like to develop
now the regional dimension of that. It is a working group, composed
of officers, of researchers, of representatives of the Curriculum
Council and others. I formerly had the honour of serving on it
as Chairman, but I am still familiar with its workings. It is
intending to present to the Department of Education, before Christmas,
a regional plan for dealing with such children and the sort of
provision which should be made locally. It is examining good practice,
both here—when I say "here", I should have explained,
Northern Ireland—and also in England and Wales. We are looking
at regional structures, because it must be recognised that the
needs of one Board do not stop short at the boundary of that Board,
we have to think of children in the wider region, and it is encompassing
different professionals, both from within Boards and outside Boards.
So, for those reasons, it will, I am quite confident, widen thinking
and set new targets for the provision for such children, and it
will be within the circumference of the School Improvement Programme,
and I believe will have an important influence on what schools
themselves will do, because it will range from off-site provision
to on-site. And my own Board's experience with on-site provision
is that it is normally the best provision that can meet the needs;
there is no sense then of those children being isolated or having
to be reintegrated into a school, they remain part of the school's
responsibilities, and the professional staff that we would have
would work very closely with those people. We have four outreach
teachers, based in the Kinego Centre, and we have one advisory
teacher, solely responsible for behaviour management, and she
will be supported by an individual three colleagues under the
School Improvement Programme.
(Mr Fitzsimons) Mr Chairman, most of what has
been described happens in South Eastern Board, and really it is
how we have presented it, probably differently from the others,
that has shown a difference. We have a continuum of support. The
first issue is about helping teachers in classroom management,
because some of the behaviour problems arise from bad teaching
or bad management in classrooms. Also, we are very concerned about
early identification of children who are displaying emotional
and behavioural problems, because early intervention can be very,
very helpful. And so we are anxious that schools develop programmes
for promotion of positive behaviour within the schools and that
all teachers have responsibility for that; and this would be in
common with all the Boards. We also have outreach teachers from
special schools, we have two special schools that major in this,
Longstone special school and also Ardmore special school. Longstone
deals with primary and Ardmore with secondary children. So a continuum
of provision is there, and we have various strategies for removal
of children, for helping teachers to support children, and we
also have the situation where children need to be statemented.
The one issue which I think my colleagues have not mentioned is
that we have got to recognise that some children do have psychiatric
problems, and we are concerned that the Health Boards and Trusts
are not resourced to respond quickly enough to children and adolescents
who manifest psychiatric problems, and that creates a major difficulty.
One of the major issues for schools, in terms of children with
emotional and behavioural problems, is the amount of time and
effort that is directed towards trying to contain those children,
so that they do not damage themselves and damage other children,
and this affects adversely the education of other children. So
we are anxious to get a speedy response from Trusts and Health
Boards to requests for psychiatric help and for psychiatric assessments.
(Mr Topping) Chairman, could I maybe just tidy
things up, perhaps by following through on behalf of the North
Eastern Board, and, without maybe prolonging things, I think our
provision is very similar to what has been described: in-school
support for the schools to try to improve what is going on in
the classroom, outreach support from a variety of centres, short-term
support, where we can do that, or short-term placement, where
we can do that, and long-term placement, where we have to do that,
and actually statementing children, where we have to do that.
But the legislation, I think, requires us, where possible, to
try to keep children in ordinary schools, and we try to fulfil
the spirit of that legislation. I would just want to emphasise
two other points, really. One is the point that Mr Fitzsimons
has just made, in relation to the incidence of children presenting
with psychiatric problems; there is a major issue there, I think,
in terms of getting the right kind of provision for those children,
particularly with the health authorities' policies of care in
the community. And one other point, I think, which has not been
mentioned by any of my colleagues but I think is quite important,
is the role of further education. I think, for many children who
display problems of behaviour, it might be that what is being
provided for them may not be appropriate, now that is not at the
upper end of the scale but at the lower end of the scale, and
FE can provide the right kind, perhaps, of provision for them,
even though they are below compulsory school age.
Mr McWalter: Chair,
if I may just conclude, I think I have had full value for my question,
but I would just like to thank you for the very full responses
that I have had and say, actually, despite the rather aggressive
nature of my questions, in England, we have got a lot to learn
from you.
Chairman: Mr Browne,
I think you want to revisit one of the earlier sets of questions,
but you have some questions of your own as well.
Mr Browne
17. Thank you very much, Chair. Good afternoon,
and welcome, and thank you very much for the memoranda, which
I found interesting. We all have a copy of this draft Northern
Ireland Audit Office Report, and it is at least helpful, in general
terms, that we know you are in the process of commenting on that
Report; it is also helpful that you have told us that you do not
agree with all the factual observations in it. Some of my questioning
is based on some of the facts there, so it would be helpful to
me if we could, where appropriate, get a basis of factual agreement.
If I may go back to the questions that Mr Beggs asked, the first
question I would like to ask you, and I do not know how you wish
to answer this, because there may not be a consensus among you,
but, do you accept, first of all, the assertion, which is supported
by the Report, that only one-third of the review reports of the
sample that the Audit Office looked at contained adequate information
for an effective assessment? Is that accepted; albeit it is two
years old and historical, is it accepted?
(Mr Fitzsimons) In order to evaluate that, we
would have to see the documentation. If, for example, they are
making a statement like that, we would have to see the documentation,
to see, in fact, what they were looking for and what we were looking
for. I think, an annual review is, essentially, a child-centred
review, it is there to assist parents, assist psychologists, assist
the Health Board and the Education and Library Board, to ensure
that the provision which is made is adequate and that the child
is making progress. And, obviously, the form of the annual review
is standard throughout Boards, and the information that is provided,
by and large, has been found to be acceptable to all involved,
in making sure the provision is adequate. I would have to say
that the approach of the audits may have had a different dimension,
in that what they are looking for is value for money and effectiveness
and efficient use of resources, whereas, the key, as far as we
are concerned, is the progress of the child and the adequacy of
the provision that has been made for it.
(Mr Topping) Chairman, could I just maybe make
an additional comment to that, because, I think, whilst I would
agree in part with what Mr Fitzsimons was saying, I think maybe
there is another element to it, and that is that, whilst this
document is an historical document, it is also based on the 1996
Order.
18. I am about to come to that, Mr Topping,
the new Order and the Code of Practice, because I think that is
more what we should be interested in than what happened two years
ago, but I was only trying to establish, by means of what I thought
was a relatively simple question, whether or not there was a consensus
of fact, at least, on that basis. The advantage we have with,
of course, the Audit Office draft Report, is that, in paragraphs
5.25 and the ten paragraphs thereafter, they actually do set out
some of the things that they were looking for and found missing
in the papers that they looked at. And what I am trying to establish
here is, do you accept, as representatives of the respective Boards,
that those criticisms were founded in the documents, which, I
have to say, you must have provided them with, in the first place?
(Mr Topping) Chairman, can I maybe make a comment
on that, too. I think, in fact, that maybe the answer that I was
going to give goes on to answer the question that Mr Browne has
asked, because I think that the Audit Report looked at a situation
under the 1996 Order, where, obviously, we were working to a certain
regime and working within a certain framework. I think then they
go on in the Audit Report to say, in fact, best practice has shown
that the Code of Practice, when it comes into operation, will
give us much more information and much more detailed information.
So that I think, within the Audit Report, as I have read it, it
seems to be suggesting that the amount of information and the
kind of information that is available could be improved and the
practice could be improved, and I think we do accept that, we
do accept that the Code of Practice is a better way of doing it,
and the information we will get, as a result of the Code of Practice,
will allow us to make better provision and make better judgements.
And I think that is what the document says, and we do accept that,
I think it would be fair to say.
19. That brings me now exactly to why I
do not think Mr Beggs's question was answered, because I think
Mr Beggs's question was designed to convey that to you and to
ask you what arrangements you had put in place to ensure that
the new legislation and the new Code of Practice would work properly,
and that the new, more specific objectives, which were set out
in there, would be met. But I listened very carefully to the answers
and all that was ever said about that was that the new legislation
and the new Code of Practice would improve the situation. What
we are interested to know is, what have you actually done to improve
this set of circumstances that the Audit Office identified?
(Mr Topping) That is a very fair question, Chairman,
and I think what we have been doing over the last few years is
planning, in a fair amount of detail, towards the implementation
of the 1996 Order. Now part of that has been training, every single
teacher who is going to act as a SENCo., for example. A key role
under the new legislation, will be fulfilling that particular
responsibility and will be looking at how the annual reviews will
affect provision; so we are training people. We have also been
putting in place new administrative machinery and refining our
administrative machinery. Every single school, certainly, I think,
in probably all of our Boards, and maybe this can be confirmed,
but I think every single school in all of our Boards has actually
been made aware of the implications of the 1996 Order and the
Code of Practice and what it means for them. So I think we have
taken significant steps already towards making sure that the kind
of information we need and the kind of information which is better
practice is in place.
Chairman: A Division
has now been called and the bell is just beginning to sound. It
is now five past five, I am going to suspend the sitting till
twenty past five and then we will resume the examination.
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