BILLS (12-13) 146
From: Megan Cleaver
Sent: 16 April 2013 17:19
To: FRANCIS, Hywel
Subject: JCHR scrutiny of SEN reforms
Hello Hywel,
I hope all is well with you.
I read with great interest your letter as Chair of the Joint Committee on Human Rights to the Children’s Minister regarding your concerns that the reforms to SEN in the Children and Families Bill do not sufficiently meet the international obligation to increase children with SEN’s access to mainstream schools as set out under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
Scope very much shares your concerns on this and feels this is a key area the Bill in its current form fails to address. I have therefore been working closely with your colleague on the JCHR, Robert Buckland MP, who has tabled Scope’s amendment in committee which would introduce a new clause in the Bill called ‘Inclusive and Accessible education, health and social care provision’ whereby a local authority and NHS bodies must promote and secure inclusive and accessible education, health and social care provision to support children, young people and their families.
We feel this would bring about a much needed culture change in local authority commissioning and would ensure that families with disabled children and those with SEN are able to access the support they need close to home. Scope’s recent ‘Keep Us Close’ report found that 62% of families say that the services they need are not available in their local area. Furthermore,
80% of these families said the shortage of local services caused them anxiety and stress;
Half said they struggle to hold down jobs as a result of the lack of local services;
Half said that they miss out on family activities such as days out or birthdays as a result.
Scope is therefore very keen to highlight this issue of a lack of local support for families with disabled children and how the reforms in the Children and Families will fail to address this. Would you be interested in doing some media work with us around this, either in terms of giving us a quote we can use in our press work or writing a comment piece? If so, it would be really great to meet with you to discuss this further and perhaps also how you can support our campaign for inclusive and accessible universal services at report stage of the Children and Families Bill (likely to be mid-May)?
I look forward to hearing from you.
Best wishes
Megan
Megan Cleaver|Parliamentary Officer
Scope |