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Special Educational Needs and Disability (Support) Bill

I am unenthusiastic about a SENCO having a wide range of other responsibilities because it seems to me that the challenge on the SEN front is so immediate, so dramatic and so important that he or she should be able to get with that. For example, even if the SENCO will not be subject to a full-blown accredited training course, the Minister knows that I have said that an alternative approach would be actively to promote the inclusion development programme materials among SENCOs who do not get the full training course. If that SENCO is working on that, that is an additional responsibility, but it will play to his or her advantage in taking forward special educational needs provision in the school. The idea that we can have a hybrid, whereby somebody can have responsibility for SEN for a quarter of their time and that the other three quarters can be devoted to something else, seems to be a triumph of optimism over reality. I said that I wanted a duty placed upon local authorities to publish a plan 12 months after the enactment of the legislation, setting out how educational support services in their areas are to be delivered. Let me underline what I mean by that. I am talking about critical educational support services, including educational psychology, occupational therapy, physiotherapy, and speech and language therapy. I am a supporter of the Government's quality standards for special educational needs support and outreach services—I know that that is a bit of a mouthful, but it is a key Government policy and it has merit. However, I am sorry that when, in the course of discussions with the Government, I have highlighted the fact that that provision is welcome but unfortunately not mandatory, Ministers have been disinclined to make those standards mandatory upon those who provide services for children or young people with special educational needs. Will the Government look at ways of actively promoting those standards, describing them as best practice and incentivising areas to treat them as part and parcel of an authoritative approach to the issues? Even if they do not want to accept my clause 1 or—perish the thought—give my Bill a Second Reading today, Ministers might be able to say, "Yes, the hon. Gentleman's got a good point about these specialist support services that are needed, and he's right to draw attention to the quality standards and to call for their more vigorous promulgation. We will look to the children's and young people's plans as the appropriate route through which to take forward the commitment to the development and commissioning of the required quality work force to minister to children's needs."