Laura Trott: Ministers Pledge Not to Remove 'Effective' SEND Support as White Paper Nears

laura trott — Ministers have insisted that effective support for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) will not be taken away as a White Paper on sweeping school reforms is due to be published on Monday. The assurance arrives amid mounting parental anxiety and rising costs in a system widely described as in crisis.

Bridget Phillipson on preserving effective SEND support

Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has said the government will not withdraw effective SEND support and that it intends to be "spending more money", not less, on backing children with extra needs as part of the reform. She confirmed that education, health and care plans (EHCPs) will continue to have an important role in the new arrangements and that parents can expect a decade-long, very careful transition from the current system.

Phillipson said children will be reviewed in terms of their needs, noting that annual EHCP reviews are meant to happen now but do not always occur. She set out a central aim that more children will receive support more quickly and in the places they need it, and said the new school-drawn plans will be given a legal underpinning so there are clear statutory routes and principles guiding provision.

Reassessment from 2029 and new Individual Support Plans

Leaked details indicate pupils with EHCPs will be reassessed after primary school from 2029. Alongside that change, the reforms will extend legal rights so that every child with identified SEND will have a school-led Individual Support Plan (ISP). Every child, including those who do not currently hold an EHCP, will have an ISP drawn up by their school with some form of legal status.

Those moves are being framed as a way to speed access to targeted help and to broaden statutory protection beyond the current EHCP cohort. The cause-and-effect logic set out by ministers links the rising costs and pressure on the SEND system to a need for new, legally underpinned school responsibilities and reassessment mechanisms.

Laura Trott and the White Paper deadline

The White Paper setting out the full package of proposals is due to be published on Monday. Officials say the reforms form part of an effort to overhaul the system while getting costs under control; the government will set out the proposed changes and the planned timetable.

One additional headline measure on the education overhaul is that all state schools will have to join trusts. The timing matters because the package combines statutory changes for SEND with a structural shift for schools, and ministers plan to outline a decade-long transition to the new arrangements.

The involvement of Laura Trott in the policy details is unclear in the provided context.

May Race, Joseph and the families ‘beyond worried’

Parents already struggling with the current system say the reforms have intensified their anxiety. May Race describes her 12-year-old son Joseph — who is autistic, has dyslexia and ADHD and whose autism is identified as pathological demand avoidance (PDA) — as now spending almost all his time in his bedroom and no longer leaving the house. Joseph has rarely been able to attend school since he was eight and is currently too unwell even to meet professionals who might help.

Race, who lives near Winchester, says the SEND system failed Joseph and blames a lack of resources, flexibility and understanding for making him more unwell. Her experience sits alongside wider pressure on schools, overstretched professionals with huge caseloads, and local education authorities carrying perilous levels of debt as they try to meet demand.

More than 1. 7 million children in England were classed as having SEND in the academic year 2024-25, and parents commonly recount long struggles to secure diagnoses, individual care plans and appropriate school places. Anxiety among families has been described as acute in the run-up to publication of the White Paper.

Georgia Gould’s assurance and an incomplete remark

Education minister Georgia Gould said last week that children who already have specialist places and specified support will not lose them under the changes. A further portion of her comments is incomplete in the provided context and is unclear in the provided context.

What makes this notable is the combination of statutory ISPs, reassessments from 2029 and a requirement for all state schools to join trusts: together they signal an attempt to reallocate responsibility and speed access while managing growing financial pressure. The immediate effect for families will depend on how quickly schools and trusts implement legally underpinned ISPs and on the execution of the planned decade-long transition.