School leaders' union NAHT has responded to today's new figures for the 2024/25 academic year showing a 5.6% increase in the proportion of school pupils with special educational needs (SEN) - continuing a trend seen since at least 2015/16.

Paul Whiteman, NAHT’s general secretary, said: “Despite the incredible efforts of school leaders and their staff, the current system is working for neither pupils, parents or schools, and these figures again underline how the status quo is completely unsustainable.

“Schools have made it clear that they do not have sufficient core funding to meet the needs of all pupils. They face shortages of experts like educational psychologists and speech and language therapists, and a postcode lottery in accessing additional money from cash-strapped local authorities for pupils with the greatest needs - while parents are having to take councils to tribunal to get the places they want for their children due to a lack of capacity.

“The government has rightly recognised that change is needed and said its schools white paper this autumn will outline its plans for SEND reform. It will be absolutely vital that these proposals are supported by the necessary funding, however, especially if as expected the focus is on educating more pupils with additional needs in mainstream schools.

“Support is too often determined by the funding available rather than by what children really need, and this needs to change.”

The figures show the number of pupils with an Education Health and Care Plan has increased by 11.1% year on year to 482,640, while the proportion with a plan has risen from 4.8% to 5.3%.

The number of pupils with special educational needs but no plan has gone up by 3.7% to 1,284,284, with this proportion now 14.2%, up from 13.6%.

This means there are more than 1.7m pupils in schools in England with SEN in 2024/25, up 5.6%.