11 Mar 2025
Should Herts county council leaders be celebrating their continued failings for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities?
County Hall’s beleaguered SEND service has been nominated for a prestigious national award recognising its efforts in transforming the service, prompting a backslapping statement from the councillor who oversees the department.
HCC has been named as a finalist in the LGC Awards 2025 for its workforce transformation programme, Making SEND Everyone’s Business, and its induction and training programme – the Hertfordshire SEND Academy.
The SEND service has been shortlisted in the Children’s Services category for the awards, which are an annual showcase of best practice in local government, with a gala awards ceremony at London’s JW Marriott Grosvenor House Hotel in Park Lane on June 11.
Cllr Caroline Clapper, executive member for education, libraries and lifelong learning, said: “The shortlisting for the award rightly recognises the efforts to transform services for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities that have been taking place in Hertfordshire. Progress against this improvement agenda has been driven forward by a committed and hardworking team; I extend my thanks to them and wish them luck in the upcoming awards.
“While we are proud of this work and the progress it has enabled, we know that it will take time for the impact to be felt widely by families. We remain committed to continuous improvement and ensuring the best possible outcomes for children, young people and the families we serve.”
But questions have been raised about whether HCC political leaders should be celebrating their achievements given the reasons why the SEND service had to urgently transform in the first place.
Following an inspection in July 2023, Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission identified widespread and systematic failures in SEND provision across the county which have “significant negative impact on the experiences and outcomes of children and young people”.
They highlighted poor communication with families, lengthy delays in preparing education, health and care plans (EHCPs) for children.
It also criticised the poor quality of EHCPs when they are produced, and failures to put in place any measures included within EHCPs. In 96% of EHCP cases taken to tribunal in Hertfordshire, the county council has been found to have acted unlawfully, or improperly.
A priority action and improvement plan was introduced following the report, which promised extra investment into SEND provision, more school places and a fresh approach to autism and ADHD assessments.
Hertfordshire is still one of the lowest funded areas for SEND services nationwide: the f40 campaign group estimated in May 2024 that, under the existing SEND improvement plan, it would take 15 years for funding for Hertfordshire to catch up with the country’s most adequately funded council authorities.
That means that a three-year-old in Hertfordshire today would have to finish all their formal education before they would get equal funding with a child elsewhere for their SEND needs.
St Albans MP Daisy Cooper has been outspoken in the failings of the HCC Conservative administration with regards to its SEND provision over many years.
She has revealed how they declined to participate in meetings secured with Government ministers in 2021 and 2022, and in February 2023, initially refused Liberal Democrats’ calls for an extra £1 million to be invested to tackle the local SEND crisis.
Daisy said: “Conservative-led Hertfordshire County Council was given the worst possible Ofsted rating for their special educational needs and disabilities services, remains subject to a formal improvement notice, and still has an underwhelming target to complete only 60% of education, health and care plans for SEN children and families within the legal timeframe.
“The Conservative administration repeatedly resisted Liberal Democrat plans to increase funding and improve services.Only after being named and shamed, and put under the national spotlight by Liberal Democrat pressure, has the council finally been forced to invest in this critical service for our children.
“Every day I hear from families in St Albans who are being failed by the SEND system, and are desperate to see some change.
“Any recent improvements in service are from a low base, and any credit clearly belongs to the officers not the abject political leadership that has burdened our county for too long.
“But given that HCC has admitted that families and schools continue to be dissatisfied with their SEND service, any attempt by the county Conservatives to crow about this award nomination would be completely out of touch.”
Several St Albans parents with SEND children have also responded to the nomination.
One said: “This makes me furious. This is a misguided application which is adding insult to injury. Children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities are not well-served or supported in Herts. Statutory obligations are still not being met and even by HCC’s own admission they seem aware families are yet to see any benefits.
“Their press release states ‘HCC has received national recognition of improvements made to services for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities’ which is misleading and misrepresenting the fact they have only been shortlisted. ‘We have been fortunate enough to be shortlisted, despite our abysmal OFSTED report, by an awarding body with dubious standards and ethics’ would be more appropriate.
“Word in SEND groups is very strongly that statutory duty and timelines are still not being met. Our own ECHP is six months overdue. I personally know at least 20 children without a suitable school or a SEND secondary school to go to. So goodness knows how many children are in this situation in the whole of Herts!
“Even if there are now more understanding staff, they are still constrained by a lack of budget and too few special needs school places for children with an EHCP.”
Another said: “Given the pressure on local government budgets applying for this award is a shameless and misguided use of time, resources and finances by HCC. It’s a botched PR job, and a misguided attempt to improve public perception which has had the exact opposite effect amongst SEND parents.
“The shortlisted initiatives ‘Making SEND Everyone’s Business Programme’ and ‘SEND Academy’ only came about because of a disastrous OFSTED report. Following the inspection, HCC invested £5 million into improving the quality and timeliness of its EHC plans by recruiting and training more staff. It was later granted a further £2 million.
“Now, in March 2025, £7 million and two ‘initiatives’ later, so many SEND families are still waiting for a SEND school or an (updated) EHCP. Things have not noticeably improved. This application is uncouth and premature. Let HCC address all points made by OFSTED and let’s wait for the statistics to demonstrate if the large investments made have been value for money.”
Another added: “This application is wasteful of resources and out of step with my lived experience of SEND.
“I have personal experience of a new officer’s utter unfitness to practice post-SEND Academy. It’s a glorified fast track induction with a new buzzword title. It is not in-depth training or rocket science innovation, and induction is no less than the local authority has a duty to provide to its workers “Don’t get me wrong, as a former HR manager who specialised in induction, end even delivered some staff training in the past for HCC, I believe in training and this is needed, but it is not enough. We know it’s not a quality service given the massive rises in complaints, appeals, judicial reviews and the addition of a lawyer to the appeals team to sort out the overwhelming mess they are still in.
“Why can’t they wait and boast when everyone has something to boast about and finances are straight?! Do other SEND families think this initiative is returning measurable SMART outcomes and if it is ethical to celebrate a SEND team which is still failing?”
