To receive an update on the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) self-assessment and outcome of the Ofsted and Care Quality Commission (CQC) engagement meeting.

(Note: Hannah Baker (Head of SEN and Inclusion) and Hannah Pugliese (Head of Women and Children’s Commissioning – NHS Devon) have been invited for this item.)

The Sub-Board considered the submitted report which provided an update on the Co-production of the Self Evaluation Form (SEF) of Torbay Local Area for Special Educational Needs (SEND) Provision and a report of the SEND Area Engagement meeting with Ofsted on 27 February 2024.  It was nearly three years since the original inspection and now the new SEF was being developed with work also focussed around gathering the annex documents to provide evidence to support the response.  The Torbay way was to co-produce work and had seen benefits of working with parents, carers, services and users.  The co-produced Charter and Pledge had big momentum at the start but communication had not been maintained, this was being picked up to ensure that the message was reinforced.  Good feedback had been provided from children and young people that they were seeing change but this was not reflected in confidence from the parents and carers.

Members asked questions in relation to how long do we need before we get to a good place if we were inspected; the Government had announced there would be a big reform for SEND how does that fit with our written statement, and would the ISOS research paper on SEND get taken into account by the Government; do we know if the Family Hubs would receive future funding; how would the Board track progress; and was there anything the Sub-Board could do to help.

Members were advised that it would depend on the timing of the next inspection as to how we would be judged as a partnership for SEND.  The Partnership was monitoring the areas they know they can have impact e.g. schools, early help offer, mental health support in schools with Teams getting the biggest reach.

It was acknowledged that SEND was a national issue which would require huge systematic change which would take a while to affect.  There was a need to base everything on the lived experience of the young person.  It was hoped the Government would take into account all relevant research papers on SEND.  Changes to NHS policies were starting to emerge, they had been asked for a community recovery plan whereas in the past it was always a focus on acute services.  The Government had advised that any future funding would be picked up in the October spending review.

The Partnership acknowledged that work was not happening fast enough but there was a commitment, and a huge amount of work was being undertaken and colleagues now need to realign it to look at impact versus activity.

A graduated response toolkit to support those with additional help had been rolled out and was working well in some schools but needed to be rolled out to all schools.

Resolved (unanimously):

1.       that the Self Evaluation Framework be presented to a future meeting of the Sub-Board;

2.       to circulate the appendices to the Sub-Board; and

3.       that Members be encouraged to promote the Graduated Response to schools and the community and share the video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWHt3tbwjms