Member

My noble friend Lord Agnew has also highlighted some of the potential problems with Clause 55, which gives the local authority the power to direct admission of an individual child. I know the Government have argued that this is no real change in academy freedoms but simply a transfer of power from the Secretary of State to the local authority, but this is happening in the context of mainstream schools being asked to take children who, arguably, should be in either specialist or alternative provision. Of course they need certainty about where they will be educated, but the pressures to be inclusive need to be weighed against the needs of the other children in a classroom.