A senior Nottinghamshire county councillor is resisting calls to resign after an inspection found "widespread failings" in services for those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). A joint inspection by Ofsted and the CQC, carried out in February, found that children and young people were waiting too long to be assessed and that there was a lack of confidence among some about being prepared for adult life.
Services for children and young people up until the age of 25 with SEND are the responsibility of the county council and the local Integrated Care Board (ICB). In terms of waiting times for assessments, the council says the average time in Nottinghamshire is currently 32 weeks.
That is beyond the 20-week timeframe by which the Government says families should have had a completed assessment. Georgina Palmer is the Forum Lead for the Nottinghamshire Parent Carer Forum (NPCF), a charity representing the views of families who have children or young people with SEND.
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When asked whether the report's findings had come as a surprise, Georgina Palmer said: "Not at all sadly, we've been hearing some of these concerns for quite some time with the impact that long waits for assessments have been having on parents, carers, children and young people.
"Families have been telling us that they are feeling exhausted and often that can turn into despair. If they have got a child whose needs are not being met, that can escalate into a crisis of them being out of school and then parents not being able to go to work.
"In some ways we actually feel quite positive that this report has come out because it means that there must be a momentum for change. Before this, the issues were not being met with prompt enough action." Both the council and the ICB have explained that a "rapid" rise in demand for SEND services post-covid has led to a "lag" in training the amount of specialists needed.
But opposition figures argue there are not enough financial resources to support SEND services in Nottinghamshire. It is this issue which has led to calls for the council's Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Councillor Tracey Taylor, to consider her position.
Labour's Councillor Michelle Welsh, the Shadow Cabinet Lead for Children and Young People's Services at Nottinghamshire County Council, said in a statement: "At the children's scrutiny meeting last December, we were given a report which clearly showed that the council was not delivering for SEND families.
"We were told there wouldn't be enough funding or enough places provided to fix the problem and meet the growing need for special educational and disability services. We were also told that the scrutiny committee would launch a review in January. This hasn't happened despite it now being nearly six months overdue.
"In that time, some children have missed months of school because the council aren't providing the support they need. It isn't good enough.
"The Labour Group are calling on Councillor Taylor in her leadership position as cabinet member to back Labour's call for the Government to do more to ensure the council can support all SEND families and if she is unwilling to do that, to reconsider her position."
But Councillor Taylor said: "It's important to recognise this report speaks to the current effectiveness of the partnership, which is clearly not supporting families and young people with SEND as it should. My role now is to make sure Nottinghamshire County Council's part in the partnership is better and we are well underway with taking the actions we need to, starting with the setting up of the improvement board under the guidance of Dame Christine Lenehan."
Dame Christine is the Director of the Council for Disabled Children (CDC) and previously led an inquiry into abuse at children's homes in Doncaster. In regards to leading the improvement board, Dame Christine said: "Whilst the challenges highlighted in Nottinghamshire’s inspection report exist to varying degrees across the country the impact on the lives of children, young people and families in Nottinghamshire requires urgent attention.
"I welcome the opportunity to support the SEND Partnership Improvement Board as Chair to bring national learning from CDC's work across the country to support an accelerated approach to improve outcomes and experiences for children and young people in Nottinghamshire."
On Dame Christine's appointment, Georgina Palmer added: "We do feel that there are some good things going on at the moment. Dame Christine Lenehan is a notable figure to be leading the improvement board and it's useful to be having someone from outside the authority looking at this."
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