Claire Young

That is one approach, but we need to ensure that it does not take away from the high-needs approach. The point is that we have to fund both early intervention and the high-level needs that have resulted from the lack of early intervention. The previous Government declined to fund an additional 200 special school placements when they signed the safety-valve agreement. When I met the Minister for School Standards, she did so too, saying that the focus is on providing places in the mainstream. Increased inclusion is a sound ongoing policy, but pupils cannot make the switch overnight. We need a fairer distribution of capital funding as well as revenue funding. Another issue with SEND funding is the notional £6,000. To give one example, a headteacher locally told me that more than 60% of their allocation goes on the high number of children with EHCPs they have on roll, leaving less than 40% to support all the other children on the record of need. School funding does not recognise that there can be great disparities between communities and schools, even in the same local authority area. Some acquire a reputation for being good at supporting those with additional needs and suffer financial consequences, and some communities in an authority have greater need than others. The formula for distributing SEND funding and more general schools funding does not reflect that, and it means that schools in different parts of the country with similar cohorts are treated very differently.