Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to ensure that children with special educational needs are able to access support services close to home.

Most children and young people with special educational needs or disabilities (SEND) are able to access support locally. Local authorities must publish a Local Offer of services that they expect to be available in their area to meet the education, health and social care needs of children and young people who have SEND, which should be kept under review. In September 2019, we launched a major cross-government review of the SEND system, to look at how we can improve support for children and young people with SEND. We have announced major investment in education, including an additional £780 million for children and young people with the most complex needs, bringing total high needs funding to over £7 billion. In our recent manifesto we have committed to delivering more school places for children with complex SEND and have allocated £365 million capital funding to local authorities from 2018 to 2021 for them to increase number of places available locally and enhance facilities.