‘No Party’ Has Plans for Funding Special Needs Pupils, Says Think Tank

“No party” has made commitments to address the level of funding for special educational needs and disability (SEND) in their manifestos, which “poses a serious threat” to provision, an education think tank has warned. The Education Policy Institute’s (EPI’s) analysis of the main political parties in England said that the “lack of urgency and detail” on how they would support SEND pupils was “of pressing concern.” While there are some commitments, “no single party addresses the challenges of the SEND system holistically, and all would require significantly more detail,” said the analysis published on Thursday. The report stressed: “Given the highly perilous state of high needs funding there is concerningly very little from any of the main parties by way of commitment to either the level of funding offered, or how it is distributed....