The biggest shake-up of special educational needs in a decade
The Story
The Times
3.9 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 25 February 2026
⏱️ 25 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On Monday, the government released its plan to reform SEND, the system that supports children with special educational needs and disabilities, in England. It’s used by around one in five children and Keir Starmer is promising £4 billion over 3 years to overhaul it. But what’s changed, who’s affected and how will the government pay for it?
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Guests:
- Georgia Lambert, education and news reporter, The Times.
- Hayley Harding, SEND campaigner.
Host: Luke Jones.
Producers: Olivia Case and Micaela Arneson.
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Read more: Keir Starmer: I’ll ensure no child with special needs is left behind
Further listening: Broken trust: Inside England's maternity scandal
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | From The Times and the Sunday Times, this is the story. I'm Luke Jones. |
| 0:12.4 | Once he got the support he needed to stay calm effectively and manage school, it was the |
| 0:18.6 | difference between me dragging him in every day, kicking and |
| 0:21.1 | screaming. I remember getting him out the car when he was screaming and being over fighting me to try and |
| 0:25.0 | stay in there to just walking in happy. Like this morning, he's gone in happy. No problem at all. |
| 0:30.9 | This is Haley Harding. Mother of two, her youngest is eight-year-old Connor. Generally, his disposition |
| 0:36.4 | is just lovely. |
| 0:38.6 | People love being around him. |
| 0:43.8 | He's got so much enthusiasm for life and a nerd when it comes to tanks at the moment. |
| 0:49.4 | So he can name you every single military tank from the past, probably, I don't know, 150 years. |
| 0:53.2 | Fascinating what he knows inside that very young head of his. |
| 0:55.1 | But yeah, he's lovely to be around. |
| 1:01.6 | Connor gets help under the Send Program, the special educational need system in England. And it's made a massive difference. Even academically, he went from behind to now where he should be |
| 1:08.3 | comparable to his peers. He goes to a mainstream school, so he does get |
| 1:12.5 | sent transports and he goes in through a separate entrance to his peers, so it's quieter. And then |
| 1:18.3 | throughout the day, he has in a slightly sort of adapted curriculum. He's academically able, |
| 1:23.6 | so he will join him with the lessons to the extent he can, but he has a table at the back. |
| 1:27.6 | So if he gets overwhelmed, he can move away. |
| 1:29.8 | But also he has the facility of a one-to-one that should he need to be taken outside, |
| 1:34.6 | have a walk around the school, anything to desensitize him, then he has that sort of facility there. |
| 1:40.5 | But it's very much a sort of an ongoing fluid process as well in terms of what his day |
| 1:45.1 | looks like because the teachers are obviously constantly changing their methodology to adapt |
... |
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