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As we know, parents do not feel fully supported and involved in the current system, which causes problems,
and many teachers in mainstream schools find it hard to cope because of lack of resources. The report commissioned by the National Union of Teachers, “The Cost of Inclusion”, has made a valuable contribution to the debate in highlighting the wide variety of special needs. Given that there is such an array of special needs, we should not use a single terminology. Obviously, individual children will need their requirements met in different ways.
The NUT report also highlights that, once one moves from primary to secondary school, the situation becomes even more complex. Children with special needs relating to mental health face a huge gap in resourcing for children’s mental health services. While I acknowledge the massive increase in resources from the Government, I am sure that all Members know of inadequate provision locally. That puts enormous pressure on teachers and, although I have not seen the statistics, I think that that is a good reason for teachers deciding that they cannot cope any more. That is reflected in the point that more learning support assistants and teaching assistants—whatever we like to call them—are probably needed to make inclusion work. Being able to give more individual attention to children with behavioural difficulties is the No. 1 item that teachers mention to me. If they had that ability, they could make inclusion work. They want to make it work and feel proud when they do so, but it is difficult with all the constraints.
In relation to the points made by the hon. Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Ms Smith), I agree strongly about the need to have a spectrum of support. That fits into my argument that we have swung the pendulum instead of getting the right balance. It is important for a local education authority to give a strong, strategic lead on special educational needs. Perhaps we should not rehearse the arguments again, but with different types of schools, including those becoming more autonomous from the local education authority, it is more difficult to promote collaboration, which is especially important in relation to special needs, between all the schools within an LEA. A special school’s numbers might fall for all sorts of reasons, but it is important to keep the resources of that school together and to have outreach workers with specialities supporting mainstream schools. However, such collaborative working requires the local education authority to pull everything together. I agree that pupil referral units, learning support areas and learning zones are needed in which specialist intensive help can be provided alongside mainstream school.
Training is essential and is probably mentioned in one of the many new clauses in the group. As we discussed in Committee, that applies to teachers, special educational needs co-ordinators and, I would add, the various teaching assistants—that is a slight omission from the new clause concerned. I still feel nervous about the idea that any closure of a special school should have the authority of the Secretary of State. I find that a surprising proposal from the Conservatives, as they keep telling me that the Secretary of State is causing all the closures in the first place with the policy being operated. I do not therefore know why they have such confidence in central Government in that respect.
My main concern is about the proposal that the Secretary of State shall consent to the closure of a special school only if there are places at nearby special schools. Of course, when one is managing a comprehensive policy for special educational needs, one might close a special school that does not have technology and science facilities—because it was built in the years when children with special educational needs were neglected—in order to build a brand-new unit, which might be on the site of a mainstream school. I cannot see the amendment concerned working.
Generally, we greatly support the sentiments behind this group of amendments, because this is a debate that should be held, and it would be a good idea, as the NUT’s report suggests, to have an independent review of inclusion. Perhaps we should stop pretending that we can carry out a policy of inclusion on the cheap.
Mr. Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op): The hon. Lady might know that the Education and Skills Committee is nearing the end of a thorough inquiry into special educational needs. I have been listening intently to the discussion, but in relation to the automatic suggestion that there should be an independent inquiry, I assure her that the House has an effective means of carrying out good, independent inquiries.
Annette Brooke: I thank the hon. Gentleman. I know, of course, that the Select Committee is carrying out that inquiry. The suggestion came from an earlier debate on special educational needs and I remember him responding during that debate. I hope that I was not ignoring the role of the Select Committee by pointing out that we need to have this debate about cost and make sure that the money is following the pupils, especially in this area.
Apart from the caveats that I have mentioned, we are sympathetic to the new clauses. I hope that the Minister will take our comments on board and give us some indication of the way forward. The severe pressures in mainstream school, which are not serving pupils, teachers or parents well, cannot continue.
Mr. Gordon Marsden (Blackpool, South) (Lab): I am delighted to speak to new clause 30 and other new clauses and amendments tabled by me and my hon. Friends.
Perhaps I can begin, as an effective way of structuring my remarks, by referring to the briefing on the new clauses and amendments, which states that they are designed to strengthen the rights and position of disabled children and those with special educational needs, with or without statements both for existing and for future schools. That follows on from discussions with the Special Educational Consortium and other disability and special educational needs groups about their concern that, in certain key areas, the Bill needs to be beefed up to ensure that the position of such children is protected. My hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Sheerman) has already mentioned the fact that his Select Committee is conducting a dedicated SEN inquiry. In its inquiry into the White Paper, we also took evidence on some of the issues,
albeit briefly. I share the concerns of others that these matters need a broader airing on the Floor of the House, not least because they did not receive an adequate airing in the latter stages in Committee.
The amendments and new clauses tabled by my hon. Friends and myself cover three separate areas: setting training standards in special educational needs and disability issues for teachers; ensuring that fair admissions are a school requirement and are properly monitored; and, perhaps most importantly, strengthening the rights of SEN and disabled pupils in exclusion matters and educational support for excluded categories. I merely add at this stage that that is essential in view of alarming figures showing that SEN children have a disproportionate number of exclusions from school and that parents often fail to receive sufficient support and advice in those circumstances.
Mr. Hayes: I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s contribution to the debate and, indeed, the important new clauses that he has tabled. May I invite him to suggest to the Select Committee that it looks specifically at the issue of exclusions, which was raised in Committee by my hon. Friends? It is a profoundly important issue, so perhaps the hon. Gentleman would like to encourage the Select Committee to deal with it.
Mr. Marsden: I thank the hon. Gentleman for those remarks. I would not want to prejudge the final deliberations or conclusions of the Select Committee, but I would say—I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield would endorse this—that we have taken a broad range of evidence, both oral and written, and that the issues that the hon. Gentleman raised are covered by it. I wholly accept that they are vitally important.
Mrs. Dorries: It is important to mention that about two thirds of all children excluded from school have special educational needs; that is, two thirds of the total number excluded at any one time.
Mr. Marsden: I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. She will see, as I continue with my remarks, that I will provide further statistics that underline her point.
New clause 30 specifically deals with professional standards for teachers, aiming to ensure that they demonstrate an understanding of SEN and disability legislation. That is terribly important because, without ensuring the inclusion of SEN children and without specialist support services, many children will not achieve their potential. The majority of deaf children, for example, are now educated in mainstream settings, but many still need appropriate support and provision.
I refer hon. Members to the Ofsted report of 2004, which dealt with the issue of inclusive schools and children with special educational needs and disabilities. It states that only a minority of mainstream schools meet special needs very well and that others are becoming better at doing so. However, the report also notes that few schools evaluate their provision for pupils with SEN systematically so that they can establish how effective the provision is, with many
schools undertaking too little forward planning to ensure that provision was in place. It said that
“when they coped poorly, this was often attributed to pupils’ difficulties rather than the school’s inability to provide adequately.”
That is a leitmotif, highlighting an issue that we must deal with.
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Reference has already been made to the recent NUT report, “The Costs of Inclusion” published by Cambridge university. I shall cite from it because it provides important evidence about standards. It states:
“In the absence of professional development, teachers are sometimes ‘trained’ by parents, placing reliance on parental knowledge and expertise. Input on most initial training courses is minimal and few new teachers are able to develop strategies for meeting the needs of pupils with specific learning difficulties. ‘On the job’ training is also inadequate.”
There is also sometimes a strong lack of understanding in schools of the requirements of the Special Educational Needs and Disability Discrimination Act 2001. The National Autistic Society report, “Make School Make Sense”, concluded that in mainstream schools, only 27 per cent. of parents say that all their child’s teachers have been able to adjust their approach and teaching materials, thereby meeting their legal duties under the 2001 Act to differentiate the curriculum for SEN children.
Finally, on the matter of training and development, I would like to cite two specific examples because I am mindful of the point made by the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) in his opening speech—that we should view the problem in the context of real individuals, real families, real pressures and real crises rather than by trading statistics across the Floor of the House.
These examples come from the National Autistic Society. A 13-year-old boy with Asperger’s syndrome attended a mainstream school, part-time, to facilitate his integration process. His mother and a neighbour went to the school to find him standing facing a wall with a female teacher and assistant head teacher on the other side of the room. She went to talk to him. He had a tantrum, but was not physically aggressive. The female teacher intervened and tried physically to restrain the boy. The tantrum worsened and the boy ended up on the floor with all four adults trying to restrain him. He is then alleged to have kicked the female teacher and the police were called. The boy was calm when they arrived and was allowed to leave the school without comment, but he was formally excluded as a result of the incident. Three months later, he was actually arrested, with no recollection of the earlier incident being made, and he probably had no understanding of why he had been arrested.
Three important implications apply. First, there should be proper training in and guidance for staff on the appropriate use of force. Secondly, appropriate provision should be made in respect of behaviour policy and disciplinary penalties. Thirdly, as I have already said, it is vital that teachers are trained in SEN and disability legislation and requirements. A range of other examples across the autistic spectrum disorders
could be mentioned. In that context, it is worth saying that there is often a false assumption that children with disabilities have low intelligence. In certain groups, and particularly among children with Asperger’s syndrome, nothing could be further from the truth. That is a major misunderstanding that must be dealt with in training and related areas.
I want to put on record the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Kingswood (Roger Berry) and I have had useful discussions with the Under-Secretary in the other place. We have already had a very helpful and supportive response from him and I am sure that the Minister will want to add to it today. I do not want to trespass on what he may say later, but on the issue of professional standards for teachers, I am reassured by the fact that a revised set of standards for qualified teacher status will be produced shortly. They will help to tackle some of the problems that I have mentioned. I understand why Ministers should think that there is no need to incorporate or update these references in statute, but the new clause does not preclude the updating of guidance or professional standards for SEN. I am sure that the Minister will respond to the point later, but what we are attempting is simply to set basic minimum requirements that could and should be supplemented and complemented by further guidance.
The other point that I would make about the proposed consultation on the standards is that, assuming their wider acceptance, they will be initially used in pilot schemes only—they will not be compulsory—because of which we should have a further discussion of whether we need to include more explicit standards in the Bill or, indeed, in other guidance. If my hon. Friend the Minister cannot develop that suggestion today, I hope that that will happen when the Bill passes to the other House.
Time is pressing, so I want to focus specifically on new clause 80, which was alluded to by the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke). New clause 80 and the associated new clauses that my hon. Friends and I have tabled are designed to address behaviour policy and exclusions. From my example of the boy with Asperger’s syndrome, I hope that it is clear to the House how vital it is that we get things right in this respect. There is a lack of understanding about the requirements of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 in schools. Of course the DDA requires schools to make reasonable adjustments to ensure that pupils are not discriminated against because of their disability, but the hon. Member for Mid-Bedfordshire (Mrs. Dorries) made an entirely valid point in intervening on me a few moments ago: two thirds of all exclusions involve pupils with SEN.
The Audit Commission report of 2002, “Special Educational Needs: a mainstream issue”, suggested that children with SEN, including those without statements, account for the vast majority permanent exclusions—almost nine out of 10 from primary schools and six out of 10 from secondary schools. So it is important to evaluate behaviour policy and disciplinary penalties to ensure that they are justified in the particular circumstances of pupils with SEN and those with disabilities. It is essential that we ensure that appropriate special provision is made for pupils with
SEN that will reduce the risk of unnecessary exclusion. The Department for Education and Skills has very strong guidance on the issue: schools should try every practical means to maintain the pupil in school, including seeking LEA and other professional advice and so on. Again, all too often, that advice is not taken up.
I also want to talk about pupils with SEN who have multiple fixed-term exclusions. Almost 4 per cent. of pupils with statements of SEN and 2.6 per cent. of pupils with SEN without a statement have one or more fixed-term exclusions in a year. It is very important that children who are not registered as permanently excluded but who still do not attend schools regularly due to multiple fixed-term exclusions should be provided for appropriately, especially given the number of informal or unofficial and, quite frankly, sometimes illegal exclusions of pupils with SEN. That issue will be familiar to many hon. Members because it comes to them by way of their casework, and for many hon. Members and certainly for me, it is one of the things that makes us have such a strong focus on the importance of the issue.
I want to refer to what has been done in this respect since September 2002, when the Special Education Needs and Disability Act 2001 came into effect, and to refer to the new disability equal duty that schools and local authorities have under the Disability Discrimination Act 2005. Again, I am grateful to the Minister in another place and his officials for the comments and assurances that they have offered in that respect. They say that
“the resource was developed with schools and local authorities for schools and local authorities and fulfils a commitment we gave in our SEN strategy, ‘Removing Barriers to Achievement’”.
That shows how some schools are already meeting the duties effectively and provides a range of guidance and training activities. I understand that that guidance will be available in printed form very shortly.
The key phrase to consider, however, is “some schools”, which suggests that the standards are very good, but that they are still not being implemented widely enough. They need to be stated more explicitly and more needs to be done to implement them. Although I accept the Government’s assurances on the issue and that the new duties under the DDA 2005 will help with the exclusions issue, it is important they do not consider that the job is done. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will reflect on the fact that the Government should use the opportunity of the time between the Bill leaving the House if it receives its Third Reading and passing to the other place to talk to the Special Education Consortium and the other disability charities that have made representations to discover whether such things can be strengthened above and beyond the existing DDA legislation.
Mrs. Betty Williams (Conwy) (Lab): Does my hon. Friend agree that quite a number of the exclusions from schools and LEAs that involve pupils with special educational needs are caused by the delay in statementing those children? If the statement is not made at an early stage, all the members of staff will not be aware of that child’s needs. That leads to more serious behaviour problems if it is not addressed very early in that child’s life.
Mr. Marsden: I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. I know of her strong interest in these issues, and she is absolutely right to pinpoint the issue of early intervention and the concerns that she expresses about statementing. Statementing is very complicated, but the sort of delays that she refers to are apparent. Despite the legislation, delays occur in providing alternative education for children with SEN who have been excluded. I caution Ministers not to believe that, merely because the extremely welcome new clauses on discipline will reduce the period in which action should be taken, we should automatically assume that that will mean that everything is splendid. A conscious effort needs to be made to monitor the implementation of those provisions, to consider the way in which local authorities deal with the issue and, where and if appropriate, to give further guidance and support in that respect.
I want very briefly to return to where we go on these issues. It is evident from what I have said and from the helpful responses that we have received that there is no one solution to the sorts of the problems that I have been highlighting today. The solution is not just a question of legislation, nor of guidance; it is not even just a question of good practice. It is a question of ensuring that all three of those aspects are joined together.
Yes, I believe that the Government should look carefully at the new clauses and amendments that we have proposed to see whether more could be done to strengthen the legislation, but the most important thing is that they see, and we all see, the connection between those three areas and the need to keep the pressure on, to put it bluntly. Only by keeping that pressure on will the needs of children with disabilities and SEN and of their parents be met. We must remember that a substantial number of children with SEN have parents who either have or have had special educational needs. Sometimes, it is a question not just of dealing with the needs of one generation, but of dealing with those of two generations.
I make my final point in reference to a previous discussion. I think that someone used the word “Manichaean” earlier, but please let us not get hung up on the idea that the special schools issue is a complex battle between good and evil, or this year’s zeitgeist as opposed to last year’s zeitgeist.
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