We may not have had a change of government since I last wrote, but we have had a change of prime minister, a new secretary of state for education and a partial reorganisation of ministers at the Department for Education (DfE). Here is a reminder of departmental responsibilities.

Changes at the DfE

When Andy Burnham formed his cabinet, Lucy Powell was appointed to replace Bridget Phillipson as education secretary. Josh MacAlister, Georgia Gould and Jacqui Smith remain in the department, but with some changes to their responsibilities:

• Josh remains children and families minister, but an added duty will be to deputise for the education secretary in emergencies
• Georgia continues to be schools minister and to oversee SEND, but with the addition of having responsibility for special schools, including independent special schools
• Jacqui (otherwise known as Baroness Smith of Malvern) will continue to be minister for skills working across the DfE and the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).

Paul Waugh, a former journalist, who has been an MP since July 2024, has taken over Olivia Bailey’s role as minister for early education.

Although Angela Rayner combined the post of deputy prime minister and deputy leader of the Labour Party, these roles have returned to being split. Although she doesn’t use the title, Louise Haigh’s role is, in effect, deputy prime minister, while the Labour Party deputy leader is Lucy Powell, which may give her more clout than many education secretaries.

The Schools White Paper

When the long-awaited schools white paper, Every Child Achieving and Thriving, appeared on 23 February this year, it covered a multitude of topics. Chapter three, ‘Sidelined to included’, is all about how the SEND system may change. At the same time, the government consultation SEND Reform: Putting children and Young People First was published. When I last checked, the DfE was still wading through the avalanche of responses!

The Education for All Bill

We don’t yet know if the way people have responded will have any effect on the changes the government is planning, or whether the new regime of Burnham and Powell will have their own ideas. What we do know is that, when he opened Parliament in May, King Charles announced that there would be an Education for All Bill: ‘A Bill will be brought forward to raise standards in schools and introduce generational reforms of the special educational needs system’.

This will include proposals for a new legal duty to put an Individual Support Plan (ISP) in place for every child and young person with SEND (including those who have EHCPs) and an updated SEND Code of Practice.

Any legislative changes are not expected to come into effect before September 2029. Until then, the current system remains largely in place. However, changes that don’t require legislation are already becoming apparent.

What is already happening

It has been clear for some time that a main plank of the changes is to make mainstream settings more inclusive, so they are able to educate pupils with a wider range of needs. This is partly to be achieved by creating thousands of ‘inclusion bases’.

Inclusion base

The term ‘inclusion base’ replaces a mixture of terms that have been used to describe a variety of units and support bases. Those that already exist and the thousands more that are created, will use the term inclusion base. According to the guidance, which appeared in June this year: ‘Inclusion bases are provisions within mainstream settings for children and young people with additional needs. Typically, they support children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), or requiring support for behavioural or pastoral reasons, including those at risk of exclusion or low attendance.”

The guidance goes on to say that these bases should be designed with a particular cohort of children and young people in mind.

As originally planned, two types of bases are envisaged:

• support bases, which are commissioned and funded by individual settings, academy trusts or local groups of schools
• specialist bases, which are commissioned and funded by the local authority. Pupils may come from different schools in the area, as well as from the host school.

It is suggested that support bases will be mainly for those needing Targeted Plus support, while specialist bases will deliver specialist support. Further details can be found in the non-statutory June 2026 DfE guidance, Inclusion Bases in Schools.

Inclusion strategy

From 31 December 2026 and annually thereafter, mainstream schools are required to produce an inclusion strategy. Eventually, this will replace the current SEN information Report (SIR). As this is a legal requirement, unfortunately they will both run side by side for the time being. In the document Developing an inclusion strategy using the inclusive mainstream fund, as well as explaining what needs to be done, there is a template for writing an inclusion strategy, which it may be best to follow.

Currently, special schools aren’t required to have an inclusion strategy and they do not benefit from accessing the inclusive mainstream fund.

Experts at hand

Another main plank of the changes is an Experts at Hand (EaH) service. In June 2026, the government issued a press release, Local areas prepare new Experts at Hand teams. This came jointly from the DfE and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and refers to what should be in place from September 2026.

The text begins as follows:

‘More children and young people with SEND will get specialist support without needing a diagnosis, as the government begins rolling out a new Experts at Hand service across England backed by new £1.8 billion investment.

‘Every local area will now begin expanding access to speech and language therapists. occupational therapists, specialist teachers and educational psychologists who will work directly alongside mainstream schools, early years settings and colleges, helping staff identify needs earlier and put support in place more quickly.’

While this is exactly the support that mainstream settings should be able to draw on, there is no indication of where these additional professionals are coming from, only that there will be ‘expanding access to them’, which could be tricky if they aren’t there to be accessed!

A new expert panel

Rather confusingly, the same press release announces the creation of a new ‘expert panel’ chaired jointly by Tom Rees (who chaired the DfE’s Expert Advisory Group on Inclusion) and Dr Anne Gordon, head of clinical innovation research, New Hospital Programme, NHS England. Their task is not to do with Experts at Hand. Instead, the panel is asked to shape the ‘specialist provision packages’ (SPPs) for children with the most complex needs and to create the ‘National Inclusion Standards’, which have been the subject of discussion for many years and are due to set out what children and families should expect by way of support from their mainstream setting, so that there is consistency across the country.

For children and young people with the most complex needs, SPPs will underpin education, health and care plans (EHCPs), setting out the support needed, such as specialist teaching and therapies, communication aids and assistive technology.

EaH – information for mainstream settings

Returning to the EaH service, another useful document is The DfE’s June 2026 guide Experts at Hand: what those leading and working in mainstream settings need to know.

This describes EaH as a core pillar of SEND reform, explaining that it is intended to enhance and build on what mainstream settings already do:

• strengthen the ability of mainstream settings to identify and meet needs earlier
• support children and young people without having to rely on intensive individual referrals
• be delivered in and alongside mainstream settings, bringing health and education expertise closer to where children and young people are
• support settings to deliver high‑quality inclusive practice consistently
• focus primarily on group, class or whole‑setting approaches.

After explaining that support from professionals will include ‘specialist teachers from alternative provision and specialist settings, who will share speech, language and communication or sensory needs expertise, and short-term placements when required’, the guidance mentions the type of support that will be provided. This includes:

• observing children and young people in their learning environment to assess their needs
• training and coaching staff to be better able to identify needs, develop appropriate support and embed inclusive practice in everyday teaching and learning
• providing access to advice to help teachers deliver effective strategies to support children with additional needs
• working with parents and carers to co-produce inclusive support, including developing resources, workshops and approaches that help them understand their child’s needs and ensure their voices shape practice and provision
• providing support in small groups or across the whole class, with one-to-one help provided occasionally where it is most needed.

It is hoped that this is a way of providing effective support early, preventing some needs from escalating, and building the skills and confidence of staff.

A final comment for now

While there may be many people who are wondering what is happening to SEND reform, perhaps thinking the government is waiting until it has finished analysing the thousands of responses it had to the consultation, it is clear that much has been going on in the background. As there has been so much information on the changes to the SEND system between June this year and September, I’ve refrained from trying to cram in any other SEND-related information.

The current changes are described as a 10-year reform process. Taking time may be the right approach, but it does raise concerns about how many politicians could come and go during that time. The current changes began in 2019 under a Conservative government. Next came an overwhelming victory for Labour, which somehow resulted in a change of prime minister and his cabinet. They say a week is a long time in politics, so things aren’t likely to stand still over the course of a decade.

Nevertheless, we’ll live in hope that the changes that are introduced will help to improve a system crying out for change.