Anger over city cuts to special needs transport

A UNION has said a consultation exercise run by Leicester City Council on cutting post-16 special educational needs (Send) transport was inadequate and must be re-run.

Unison claimed the council announced the plans to implement significant cuts to the service for pupils aged 16 to 19 after a “deeply flawed” consultation process held over two years ago.

It said the proposals formed part of a worrying trend of Send cuts, which it claimed were implemented with “little meaningful consultation with those most affected, in this case, the students themselves and their families”.

It claimed that the council had repeatedly ignored its offer to work with it to campaign for more funding from the Conservative government to save struggling public services.

In response to the claims, a city council spokesman said the authority had carried out a wide-ranging three-month consultation and would not be re-running it.

Unison claimed the decision to withdraw the funding was made following a consultation held in 2021.

At the time, it said, the council sought views from more than 700 affected families, and received nine responses, or 1.2 per cent.

It claimed that none of the responses came from Send students themselves, who, it said, were “seemingly not included” in the discussion, with correspondence being targeted only at parents and/or carers.

It also claimed the consultation was targeted at families who were in the Send transport system at the time it was run.

Now, more than two years later, additional families requiring Send transport had not had the same opportunity to express their views, it said.

The union further claimed the content of the consultation was deficient, claiming none of the questions asked “even touched on the core issue of whether or not the changes would prevent or impede post-16 Send students from accessing education”.

Unison said those alleged flaws seriously undermined the conclusions drawn from the consultation, and cast doubt upon exactly what the impact of the changes would be. The union declared it was calling upon the council to run another, more comprehensive, consultation, and maintain current funding levels while it was ongoing.

Parents who have been fighting the changes agreed with the union’s claim that consultation on the proposals was inadequate as they gathered in Town Hall Square to protest on Thursday evening.

It followed an announcement earlier this year by then assistant city mayor for education, Councillor Vi Dempster, that the “difficult decision” to end school transport funding for young people over 16 with special education needs and disabilities had been made as a result of massive government cuts to city council funding, alongside huge rises in the cost of social care.

Tom Barker, a Unison steward at Ash Field Academy, said: “The actions of Leicester City Council threaten to prevent Send students from being able to attend school – something which is a statutory requirement.

“At the very least, the council needs to re-run the consultation in a more comprehensive way, so that it can properly understand the true impact of these changes before making a final decision.

“We need to develop a serious strategy to prevent vital services like these from being cut.

“But once again Leicester City Council is claiming there is nothing to be done.”

A council spokesman said: “We carried out a three-month consultation exercise which included writing to all parents and carers with a child over 14 years old who had an Education and Care Plan, not just those already using post-16 Send transport.

“The proposals were also shared with head teachers, the Local Parent Carer Forum, and The Big Mouth Forum, which is made up exclusively of young people with special education needs.

“The policy change was then clearly displayed on the council’s web pages about Send transport.

“Although we extended the funding beyond April, when it was due to finish, to the end of the summer term, the policy is in place and has been implemented, so there will be no further consultation.

“Due to years of government cuts to our funding, we will find it very hard next year to fund any service that is not legally required of us.

“If the government decided to make it mandatory for councils to provide this funding, it would also have to pay for it as a new financial burden, which we would welcome. At present there is no indication this will happen.”

At the very least, the council needs to re-run the consultation in a more comprehensive way.

Claudia Webbe MP is the member of Parliament for Leicester East. You can follow her at www.facebook.com/claudiaforLE and twitter.com/ClaudiaWebbe