Invest in Pupil and Family Services

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The issue

A lack of access to crucial support services that pupils and schools rely on has been an issue for many years, but the pandemic has exacerbated and shone a spotlight on the problem.
Schools are increasingly finding it hard to access these crucial services and are having to step in and provide them themselves without the funding or resources to do so.
CAMHS services, already under pressure before the pandemic, has experienced a surge in referrals since 2019. Schools report a growing number of pupils being refused treatment as they do not meet the criteria. These needs are then falling back to schools.
Recent survey fundings from NAHT and Place2Be have revealed the scale of the current issue facing pupils and schools.
Similar pressures exist on other key services such as speech and language therapy and educational psychologists.

What we want to see

The government must reverse cuts to crucial support services that schools rely on and begin a sustainable programme of investment so that schools are able to access these services for their pupils in a timely manner.
The government must ensure that every school has fully funded mental health support available for their pupils and it is essential that they increase the capacity of social care, health and other services to meet the growing demand and to reduce waiting times.
The government’s plan for Mental Health Support Teams is promising but it needs to go further and faster otherwise we risk a continuing postcode lottery when it comes to support for children.

What we want you to do

Convene an MPs roundtable in your region (see our briefing document on how here)
Write to your MP using our template letter
Share the PowerPoints and other resources (see below) with your school leader networks and governing body
Let us know when you plan to run local campaign activity so that we can help you promote the event and support you
Promote your campaigning work across Twitter using the campaign hashtags (#) and including @NAHTnews
Get active in your NAHT branch
If your colleagues aren’t members of NAHT already, encourage them to join

Our conference motion:

“Conference notes the failure to adequately fund all services which provide support and learning to children and families; specifically, schools, extended services, social services, health services and housing.

Conference also recognises education for all pupils will only be a success for the whole community when the issue of overall system funding is addressed, in a way which prevents schools from being the last redoubt for all children and family support.

Conference calls on National Executive to establish a broad-based campaign to address the funding of support for all children and family services, to provide adequate and co-ordinated funding to allow all families to prosper and thrive.”