Councils’ budgeted net spend for home-to-school transport for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) is £1.4bn in 2023/24 – a 137% cash terms increase since 2016/17 and a 23% budget increase compared to the previous year.
The huge increase is being driven by the record high in the number of children and young people with SEND receiving support from councils, according to new Local Government Association (LGA) figures.
Councils issued 84,428 Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs), which set out the provision of SEND support for each person, in 2023 – an increase of 26.6% on the previous year. The number has risen each year since 2014.
The LGA said that, as of January 2024, there are 575,963 children and young people with an EHCP.
Requests for an assessment have also increased by 20.8% since the previous year, it added.
The LGA said the rising need and cost pressures made it “imperative” that whoever forms the next government reforms the SEND system.
The association called for an improvement to mainstream inclusion of children with SEND and the scrapping of the “high needs deficits councils have built up because of the spiralling costs of providing support outstripping the SEND budgets available to councils”. These currently stand at an estimated £1.9bn.
See Room151’s Municipal Missions Manifesto series for articles from local government sector voices on resetting the relationship between national and local government under the next administration. All articles in the series so far can be viewed here.
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