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Special Educational Needs (Information) Bill

I hope we will discuss that issue further in Committee and that Ministers will take it on board. It can be dealt with under guidelines; many Members are pushing for that. It would also have been desirable to secure a new commitment to having subject-specific SEN specialists in every school who could implement a school-wide strategy for supporting pupils with specific SENs, but I am told that that needs only Government guidelines, not primary legislation. I am happy that the Government appear to be looking in that direction and I hope that the publication of further information will push them one step closer to delivering this level of support in schools for all our children. What would my Bill provide? The powers laid out in it are twofold. First, it would give the Secretary of State further powers to collect information that he considers will help to improve outcomes for children with SEN, and it explicitly states that that information must be published annually. Secondly, the Bill outlines exactly what outcomes must be monitored. Those outcomes are broadly in line with the Government’s Every Child Matters agenda, and reflect not only educational attainment but emotional well-being, contribution to society and economic well-being. That is a positive step that has not been taken before. Discussion of what information will be published has been a feature of the debate on issues related to the Bill. After all, there is a whole host of data sets and statistics that account for SEN children in our schools. We have the numbers, we have the ages, we have the ethnicity and we have the types of need for some SEN pupils, but that gives us only a snapshot. Real life happens in real time. By encouraging further analysis of existing data and annual publication of new information, we can build up a moving image that reflects changes in provision for and progress of SEN pupils. We can raise expectations for children with SEN, and therefore raise achievement levels, only by monitoring outcomes. It will be a step in the right direction to record whether children with SEN are happy, safe, enjoying school, achieving personal targets, making a positive contribution to society and, where possible, going on to achieve independent economic well-being. We can then highlight the valuable contribution that children with SEN can go on to make. Dyslexic children, for example, have dynamic and diverse brains, which can achieve tremendous results—we need only think of Winston Churchill, John Lennon or Richard Branson. We can also highlight areas for improvement, and encourage the Government to deliver those improvements. Wherever possible, we should not increase the burden on our teachers, and I assure Members that that would be a vital consideration in deciding which additional information to collect. We do not want to place an additional restrictive administrative burden on teachers. It seems sensible to use the Ofsted review of SEN in 2009-10 to inform the Government of what new information will be useful in achieving the requirements of the Bill. It might be that some of the information already collected is not fit for purpose and could be replaced by different information. Such tweaks could ensure we do not pin teachers down under piles of paperwork, but obtain information from them that will help to support them in the vital work they do. The Government’s response of October 2006 to the Education and Skills Committee review of SEN states that all student teachers must"““know how to identify children with SEN and where to seek advice on less common types of SEN””," and that they must also be able to"““differentiate their teaching to meet the needs of all children, including those with SEN””."