Conservative Parliamentary Candidate Robert Buckland will be chairing a meeting about Special Educational Needs Provision in Swindon during the Autumn. Robert plans to bring parents, professionals and those with expertise in the subject together to share information and to discuss what needs to be done to achieve a much-needed change in direction from the Labour Government.
The meeting has been trailed in today's Swindon Advertiser, which continues to publish letters supporting Robert's campaign. "May I convey my thanks to the Adver for their coverage of this vitally important issue for so many local parents" said Robert.
Here is today's article, together with a reader's letter from Julie Hedge, who has been in touch with Robert:
MORE has to be done for children with special educational needs in our schools, according to some parents and teachers.
Robert Buckland, the Conservative parliamentary spokesman for South Swindon, who has a daughter with special needs, is hoping to call a meeting later this year with parents to discuss how provision for children with special educational needs can be improved in schools.
Last week the education select committee called for stronger Government guidelines for councils to end a postcode lottery of provision.
There are different degrees of SEN, ranging from dyslexia to autism.
Some children require extra help from one-to-one tuition, while others require a statement which is produced by the local education authority.
This sets out what extra provision the child needs from school. The school must then meet those needs.
Mr Buckland's four-year-old daughter, Millie, has language problems, which means she will be behind her peers when she starts school.
"Millie will need to have a statement when she goes to school," said Mr Buckland.
"There are so many families who are not seeking help for their children and not getting an early analysis, which is vital for their progression.
"Many children are not being given a statement of special educational needs until they are past ten years of age.
"This is shocking and unacceptable."
He added: "It's time for a change. I want to see a system that puts parents in the centre of the decision-making process.
"We need to know what the policy for SEN provision is because at the moment there is no clear policy."
In Swindon there are six special schools, a pupil referral unit and nine specially resourced provision units in mainstream schools, including Kingsdown School's autism centre.
Andrea Parkinson has been a primary school teacher, working with children who have special needs, for 12 years.
"There needs to be a specialist unit in every school," she said.
"Teachers working in these units are given specialist training to meet the needs of the children.
"The units mean children can spend some of their time in normal classes and then can take time out to have one-to-one tuition as well.
"Without these units, often children are taken out of class with a teaching assistant.
She added: "If a child with SEN is in a mainstream classroom all day it can also be disrupting for other children because the teacher has to try to teach all of these very different mixed abilities."
If anyone wants more information about the proposed meeting, write to Mr Buckland at 14 Bath Road, Swindon SN1 4BA, call 07885 304713 or email rob@southswindonintouch.com
Casestudy
FIVE-year-old Brandon Styles suffers from a rare, life-threatening metabolic disorder which only affects 28 other people in the country.The Brookfield Primary School pupil has to take medication every six hours, eat a special diet and have physiotherapy.
As a result, Brandon's physical and academic development is slower than his peers.
His mum, 32-year-old Nicki, said: "Because I have a diploma in childcare I knew what options were available for Brandon so I started pushing for a statement early on.
"It means he gets 30 hours a week of dedicated help from two teaching assistants and has an individual learning plan so he meets his own targets.
"Brandon has language problems. He doesn't have a full vocabulary and he can't write yet so without this help he would be even further behind, But I feel sorry for parents who don't know where to get help from."
Ms Styles, who is training to become a teacher, has two other children, Bradley, seven, and Krystal, six, also at Brookfield.
"I'm glad Brandon can go to the same school as the others rather than having to go to a special school," she said.
"I think his development is better when he is around other children who are progressing as they should be."
The council's policy is to support children within schools'
SWINDON Council's group director for children's services, Hilary Pitts, said: "The policy of the borough is to ensure that children and young people are supported through inclusive educational arrangements as near as possible to their homes in a mainstream setting whenever this reflects their views and those of their parents and is consistent with the effective education of other children."The resources to support children and young people in Swindon are targeted in relation to needs identified and trends in population.
"Within each school in Swindon is a teacher with specialist responsibility for the identification, assessment and targeting of resource within that school.
"The local authority children's service supports schools with specific services such as educational psychology, education support service, behaviour support services, Special Educational Needs Resource and Assessment Team, Children and Families Social Care.
"In addition to this, as would be expected, colleagues from within the health service also play a key role in this area.
"Where a pupil is identified as having a specific need within a school they are given an Individual Education Plan agreed with parents that will outline the needs to be addressed and targets related to meeting those needs.
"These plans are regularly reviewed and where appropriate a pupil may progress through specific stages of intervention from support in school, the involvement of professionals external to the school and then, if necessary, to statutory assessment - this may result in a statement of special educational needs.
"There is a range of specialist provision across the borough in addition to the excellent work that is undertaken in our mainstream schools.
She said at the time of the re-organisation of educational provision in 2005 not all schools had special resourced provision.
"There were additional specially resourced provision units, special education provision was reviewed and re-shaped to focus on the needs of the children and young people within Swindon," she said.
Ms Pitts says parents should contact the school if they think their child has special educational needs.
I agree with Robert Buckland (SA, August 1) when he says there must be thousands of children in Swindon who are being failed by the local education authority.
I am a parent of a child with specific learning difficulties.
Swindon LEA has refused to give her a statement of SEN to guarantee the help she needs. 
They use blanket criteria, which means children have to be many years behind before they qualify, even to be assessed.
Being at Lethbridge Primary School without the correct help had such a detrimental effect on the self-esteem of our daughter that we were forced to remove her and pay for her to attend Calder House, a specialist school in Chippenham. There she receives the appropriate teaching and is slowly rebuilding her self-esteem.
We have fought for her to return to an LEA Secondary school. The natural choice, Commonweal, has a centre for children with SPLD but without a statement this is denied her. After a nearly two-year unsuccessful fight with the LEA, where we have involved medical professionals, educational psychologists, SENCOs, our largely ineffective local MP, and tribunals, we felt we had no choice but to release equity in our house to pay for her continuing education.
For children like our daughter, being in a class without the right help is like being part of an orchestra without being able to play an instrument. Swindon LEA looks after budgets but at the cost of children with special educational needs.
J HEDGE Old Town, Swindon
Some children are missing out
THANK you to Robert Buckland for highlighting the plight of children whose special educational needs are not being met appropriately. (Letters, August 1).
As a volunteer parent supporter, I know only too well what a struggle it can be for parents to obtain a statutory assessment, or amendments to an existing statement of needs, or a school of their choice.
The House of Commons Education And Skills Committee obviously put a great deal of time and effort into this Parliamentary inquiry before reaching its conclusions.
I hope Anne Snelgrove and Michael Wills will report back to Swindon at regular intervals and tell us of any progress in implementing the recommendations in this important report.
The inquiry has revealed some serious failings for the children involved.
Parents who would like their child to go to a specialist centre or special school find they are forced to accept a mainstream placement where the resources required are not always available.
In Swindon borough, nine units for pupils with moderate learning difficulties and the only primary unit for dyslexic pupils have closed over the past two years.
Why does the Government allow this? Special schools and units play a vital role in meeting the needs of the most vulnerable children.
Funding for children with special needs should be ring fenced and set centrally at an adequate level, so that teachers responsible for delivering provision to these children know how much funding is available to them and can plan accordingly.
Assessments should be carried out promptly if requested. How many Swindon children will enter secondary school this September with very delayed literacy skills because their needs were not identified and addressed at an early stage?
Who is accountable for this state of affairs? This really has got to stop.
D HOLLAND, Chair Swindon Dyslexia Association, Wroughton.
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Justin Tomlinson Conservative MP for North Swindon |
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Robert Buckland Conservative MP for South Swindon |
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