*SEND News Flash* Consultation on law relating to reviews of EHC plans launched today – deadline for responses 12 August

Letter from the DfE

The Department for Education has today launched a consultation on the actions that a local authority should have to take if it proposes to amend an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan following a review meeting. We are writing to alert you to the consultation and to ask for your help to raise awareness of the consultation by alerting your networks etc.

We believe that the principal audiences for the consultation paper will be:

• children and young people with EHC plans and their families
• organisations representing children and young people with SEND and their families
• LA SEND officers
• any early years setting, school, college or other setting attended by children or young people with an EHC plan
• educational psychologists, health professionals, social care professionals and others involved in the review of EHC plans

Some of the key points relating to the consultation are set out below.

We will be very interested in your views, please do consider responding: the consultation closes on 12 August.

Details of the consultation

Local authorities have various duties over when and how they must review an individual’s Education, Health and Care plan. In the SEND and AP Review Green Paper we said that we intended to change the timescale for the issuing of proposals for amending plans following annual reviews. We said that a further consultation would follow. The Department for Education has today (15 June) duly launched that further public consultation: Reviews of Education, Health and Care plans: proposed timescales – Department for Education – Citizen Space.

We are consulting on whether local authorities should:

• have an additional four weeks after review meetings to finalise any changes they propose to a plan. (A March 2022 High Court judgment has clarified that the current duty on LAs is to do this within four weeks of the review meeting); and
• have to circulate material for a review meeting a week earlier than currently.

We believe that these proposals will benefit children, young people and their families, at the same time as delivering a more workable process.

The consultation closes on 12 August.

Many thanks

SEND & Alternative Provision Directorate| Families Group| gov.uk/dfe | @education.gov.uk | fb.com/education.gov.uk

For the latest information about the SEND & AP Green Paper consultation, please click on the picture below to access the campaign page (or visit: https://sendreview.campaign.gov.uk/)