Sutton Council is embarking on a significant reform of its Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) services, aiming to create a more responsive, inclusive, and financially stable system for young people.
The Sutton SEND Reform Plan,
presented to the People Committee on Thursday, 18 June 2026, details a multi-pronged strategy to tackle the current complexities and pressures within the SEND system. This initiative is a direct response to national reforms outlined in the Every Child Achieving and Thriving
white paper and the findings of a recent local area SEND inspection.
Kieran, Director for Education in Greater Sport and SEND Communities, acknowledged that the existing SEND system is widely perceived as complex, financially unsustainable, and overly reactive. The national reform agenda seeks to bolster mainstream school provision, introduce individual support plans, and enhance access to crucial services like educational psychology and therapy. These efforts will be translated into concrete actions within Sutton's schools through the Experts at Hand
initiative. This programme involves recruiting professionals such as speech and language therapists, autism specialists, and educational psychologists to support mainstream schools, with the overarching goal of providing assistance within these settings to help reduce the escalation of needs.
Key priorities for Sutton's reform plan include rebuilding co-production with parents and carers, strengthening joint leadership and accountability, fostering inclusive practices in schools and the community, and establishing high-quality, cost-effective local provision. To ensure genuine co-production, the council is funding a development partner to establish a new Parent Carer Forum. This partner will provide the necessary infrastructure, allowing parents to concentrate on co-production and strategic governance rather than administrative tasks. The council has also actively engaged with parents and families through a dedicated SEND reforms parents group and the co-production of the SEND Family Hub.
Significant financial pressures are a central concern, including a substantial deficit in the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG). Strategies to improve financial sustainability extend beyond addressing the DSG deficit. These include strengthening mainstream school provision to meet needs earlier, introducing digital individual support plans with legal status to potentially replace Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) for less complex cases, and enhancing access to educational psychology and therapies within mainstream education. The plan also aims to reduce reliance on expensive independent providers and to develop local, high-quality, and cost-effective provision.
To bolster support within mainstream schools, Sutton is investing £1.8 million in the Experts at Hand
initiative. This funding will be used to recruit professionals such as speech and language therapists and autism specialists who will be deployed to support mainstream schools, aiming to reduce the escalation of needs. The Experts at Hand
initiative will involve the recruitment of professionals such as speech and language therapists, autism professionals, and educational psychologists to support mainstream schools. The aim is to provide support around mainstream schools as much as possible to help reduce the escalation of needs currently happening in the system.
However, the report highlights persistent challenges, notably long waiting lists for neurodevelopmental assessments. Current waits for autism assessments have increased to 18-20 months, a significant rise from the previous six months, attributed to demand outstripping capacity. While the local area partnership is implementing a 'one stop' session for parents of children on the waiting list to speak with clinicians and understand what they can do while waiting, and providing post-diagnosis support, the report does not provide a projected timeline for reducing the waiting list.
The success of the SEND Reform Plan will be measured by several key performance indicators (KPIs). The council aims for parents to feel their voices are heard and to have greater confidence in the system. There will be a focus on stronger accountability for the system's performance, and the plan seeks to ensure more children and young people with SEND feel a sense of belonging in education and their communities, experiencing reduced absence, fewer exclusions, and a decrease in those not in education, employment, or training (NEET). Crucially, the plan also aims to ensure the overall financial sustainability of the SEND system.
The anticipated impact of these reforms on Sutton's budget is significant. If the SEND Reform Plan is accepted by the Department for Education (DfE), it is expected to positively influence the financial position. The government has announced a DSG Stability Fund designed to clear 90% of local authority accumulated deficits up to the end of the 2025/26 financial year. Beyond 2028/29, SEND spending is anticipated to be covered nationally by the DfE, which should remove the DSG overspend risk from the Council's general fund. Despite these measures, the plan itself indicates that an estimated overspend of between £10-15 million per year is still projected, even with the proposed reforms.
Further details on the reform plan can be found in the Public reports pack for the People Committee meeting, and the Agenda frontsheet.
