On Monday (23rd February 2026) the Government published its SEND (Special Educational Needs and Disabilities) white paper, Every Child Achieving and Thriving.[i] For many families, this was not simply another policy announcement. It was personal.
If you have navigated the SEND system as a parent, you know the terrain: long waits, assessments that feel adversarial, meetings where you become both advocate and translator for your own child. You learn acronyms quickly. You learn resilience more slowly. You learn that the difference between provision on paper and provision in practice can be profound.
So, reform matters.
The white paper sets out a broad ambition:
- Earlier identification of need
- More consistent support within mainstream schools
- Improved workforce training
- A move toward greater national consistency in provision.
It proposes replacing Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) with a new system of Inclusion Support Plans (ISPs), intended to streamline process and reduce the adversarial culture that has grown around statutory provision.[ii]
There is much here to welcome.
The commitment to earlier intervention reflects what practitioners have long known: support delayed is support intensified. The attempt to reduce postcode lotteries in provision is overdue. The recognition that inclusion is not only about placement but about participation is important. The suggestion that achievement should be understood more broadly than a narrow set of exam outcomes hints at something deeper.[iii]
For parents who have felt they must fight the system simply to secure what their child needs, any attempt to make support less combative is encouraging.
Yet encouragement must sit alongside scrutiny.
Several organisations working closely with families have raised concerns about how the proposed changes will operate in practice. Independent Provider of Special Education Advice (IPSEA) has questioned whether replacing EHCPs with ISPs could weaken enforceable rights if legal protections are diluted.[iv] National Autistic Society (NAS) has welcomed aspects of the ambition but cautioned that reform without sufficient funding and specialist workforce capacity risks raising expectations that schools cannot meet.[v] Parent advocacy charity Contact has similarly emphasised that confidence in reform will depend on clarity around accountability and resourcing.[vi]
These concerns are not ideological objections. They are practical ones. They come from those who have seen what happens when policy promise outpaces implementation reality.
There is also a deeper question that sits beneath both welcome and caution.
Even if every structural change in the white paper were implemented smoothly, what kind of system are children being included into?
Over the past decade, education in England has increasingly operated within a culture of accountability metrics, attendance data, attainment benchmarks, and inspection frameworks. Schools are under intense pressure to demonstrate measurable outcomes. Teachers work within tight constraints of curriculum time and performance targets.[vii]
Children feel this too.
Data from NHS England show significant rises in probable mental health disorders among children and young people in recent years.[viii] Causes are complex. Pandemic disruption played a role. So does social media. So does economic stress. But it would be naïve to imagine that relentless performance pressure has no impact.
For children with SEND, the stakes are sharper. When a system is calibrated around standardisation, those whose learning profiles diverge from the norm experience friction. Inclusion then risks becoming a matter of accommodation within a structure that remains fundamentally shaped by throughput and attainment.
This is why SEND reform cannot be viewed in isolation.
If inclusion means access to the same conveyor belt, it is partial. If thriving is measured primarily by exam performance, it is narrow. If schools are structurally incentivised to prioritise measurable attainment, creative and relational aspects of education can be squeezed.
This is not a criticism of teachers. Many are working with extraordinary dedication under demanding conditions. Nor is it a dismissal of standards. Standards matter. Literacy and numeracy matter. Rigour matters.
But children are more than data points.
As someone who has worked with adults with learning disabilities, I have seen how early educational experiences echo across decades. Where belonging was nurtured, confidence often endured. Where difference was merely tolerated rather than valued, fragility followed.
The white paper speaks of every child achieving and thriving. That language is important. It gestures toward aspiration beyond survival. Yet the meaning of achievement and the conditions of thriving must be carefully defined.
Is thriving about conformity to benchmarks, or about the cultivation of gifts? Is inclusion about physical presence in mainstream classrooms, or about genuine participation? Is support a cost centre to be managed, or a shared responsibility that reveals what we believe about worth?
Reform is necessary. Families need a system that works. Schools need clarity and resourcing. Children need support without their parents becoming litigators.
But reform must also provoke reflection.
If we streamline processes without examining the culture into which children are placed, we risk efficiency without transformation. If we reduce conflict but retain a narrow imagination of success, we may calm the surface while leaving deeper pressures intact.
SEND reform is therefore both welcome and revealing. It forces us to ask what kind of education system we are building, and ultimately what kind of society we are forming.
That is where this series will go next.
[i] Department for Education, Every Child Achieving and Thriving (London: Department for Education, 23 February 2026), https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/every-child-achieving-and-thriving.
[ii] Ibid.
[iii] Ibid.
[iv] IPSEA, ‘Government Publishes White Paper on SEND Reform and Invites People’s Views’, 23 February 2026, https://www.ipsea.org.uk/news/government-publishes-white-paper-on-send-reform-and-invites-peoples-views.
[v] National Autistic Society, ‘Government Releases the Long-Awaited Schools White Paper’, 23 February 2026, https://www.autism.org.uk/what-we-do/news/government-releases-the-long-awaited-schools-white-paper.
[vi] Contact, ‘The Schools White Paper & SEND Reforms’, 23 February 2026, https://contact.org.uk/help-for-families/information-advice-services/education-learning/the-schools-white-paper-education-reforms/.
[vii] Education Policy Institute, ‘EPI Response: Schools White Paper’, 23 February 2026, https://epi.org.uk/comments/epi-response-schools-white-paper-feb-2026/.
[viii] NHS England, Mental Health of Children and Young People in England, 2023 (Wave 4 Follow-Up) (Leeds: NHS England, 2023), https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/mental-health-of-children-and-young-people-in-england/2023-wave-4-follow-up.
Series Note: This is the first of eight posts exploring SEND reform, creative education, inclusion, and the theology of the Broken Church.
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