Their stories: Parents give left behind and forgotten SEND kids a voice at County Hall demonstration
Lancashire County Council said it has a plan to improve its SEND services - but there are hundreds of parents still in limbo waiting for help in the meantime
Hello and welcome to The Lancashire Lead.
On Monday, I was at the demonstration at County Hall organised by SEND (Special educational needs and disabilities) Sanctuary which aimed to highlight the concerns and trauma of children with special needs and disabilities whose parents feel have been let down by those who should be providing support.
This is a long-running problem at Lancashire County Council - but not exclusive to Lancashire. There has been a surge of parents requesting plans to help their children who they believe may have special needs and disabilities that make school life very challenging for them.
For many kids, this means staying away from mainstream schools that are completely unsuitable but being stuck in limbo while they wait for proper support.
Lancashire County Council said they hear the concerns and are working on a solution. Today, we tell the stories of those parents and children. I thank them all for speaking with me.
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Lancashire briefing
🚘 Highways bosses are planning to change the layout of a town centre road after a bus company threatened to withdraw its services from the route because of problem parking. Stagecoach says its vehicles are sometimes unable to get past cars unlawfully parked on a narrow stretch of High Street in Garstang. Lancashire County Council has now proposed creating a so-called “build-out” into the carriageway near Stoops Weind, with the aim of deterring “inappropriate parking”.
🩺 An online petition has been launched in an attempt to try and safeguard a Kirkham care home and day centre which is one of several now under review at County Hall. Concerns were first raised weeks ago when Lancashire County Council launched a public consultation to gather views on future of its in-house adult social care services. The consultation follows the County Hall Cabinet’s decision to initiate a strategic review of services for older people and adults with disabilities, which it says will focus on ensuring high-quality care that is sustainable and meets the changing needs of residents. The move has been criticised by affected families and Reform UK’s opposition elected members.
🩱 The debate about the future of publicly-owned swimming pools in West Lancashire has reignited, after councillors clashed over a report mentioning the pools and one councillor claimed he understood the sites could face closure next year. Earlier this year, Park Pool in Ormskirk and Nye Bevan Pool in Skelmersdale both faced closure in budget plans for the current financial year, which started in April. The idea came after a West Lancashire Council report said continuing to run the two pools was not financially viable, even at reduced hours or by increasing membership fees. Labour councillors said reluctantly they had no other choice, based on council officers’ advice. the topic arose again at the latest full council meeting. It came when councillors discussed a report described as a ‘summary of key achievements’ linked to the council’s vision and priorities for the 2023-2028 period. One section had the ‘main achievements delivered for the public and the borough during 2024-25’ which included the pools. Separately, all councils are currently working towards setting their new budgets in early 2026 and awaiting a government funding review.
Their stories: Parents give left behind and forgotten SEND kids a voice at County Hall demonstration
By Luke Beardsworth
Pairs of children’s shoes were left outside County Hall to represent SEND kids whose parents say have been failed by the local authority.
Parents gathered at the Lancashire County Council headquarters in Preston in the rain on Monday as part of dozens of demonstrations happening across the country.
The shoes were left along with messages that each told the story of the struggles families have faced in getting support and advice needed.
They sought to highlight the plight of children who have been ignored or misunderstood. They said children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) have felt isolated in classrooms without the right support, pushed into mainstream schools that are not suitable and left waiting years for Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs).
Jenna Higson, mum to eight-year-old Lily and from Chorley, helped organise the Lancashire demonstration.
She told The Lancashire Lead: “My daughter Lily is eight and she’ll be nine in December. She has been without a school place for two years. We’ve been waiting for her EHCP - we applied in May 2024 and have not received a final plan.
“At the moment we’re waiting on news about a specialist school place. It kinda feels like everything is riding on that and I’m preparing myself for it to be a no, because it could be.
“If it’s a yes, it would be life-changing for us as a family. Lily is desperate to be part of a school community. She tells me all the time that she wishes she could go to school like her friends. But that environment isn’t right for her and it’s not her fault.”
The process of a decision on a EHCP should take no longer than 20 weeks from the initial request and failure to meet that target is a legal failure from local authorities. It is not clear exactly how often Lancashire County Council falls short of this requirement.
An Ofsted inspection of Lancashire’s special needs services published in February this year found that families in the county face unacceptable delays in getting the support they require.
Figures published in July found that there are 1,850 young people in Lancashire who are due to be assessed by educational psychologists for an EHCP. A further 300 children have received advice but are waiting for the EHCP to be finalised.
There were 12,200 live EHCPs in the county council area as of January this year – more than double the 5,200 a decade ago, a trend that has been seen nationally.
Andy McNae, the Labour MP for Rossendale and Darwen who joined parents at the demonstration, said that the government is working to help tackle the issue.
He told The Lancashire Lead: “We’ve got a SEND system that’s been failing parents for far too long and as a government we’re carrying out a massive review to create a new system that works for every parent.
“The system hasn’t been listening to them, responding to their needs or treating them as individuals.
“It’s a national issue - but it is still a postcode lottery and it’s worse in some places than others. Lancashire has got a long-term problem. It’s one of the highest priorities for our government and we’ve been meeting with parents to try to hear what they want.”
Hinting that local government reorganisation - the plan to abolish all councils in Lancashire and redraw the authority map - could help resolve the issue, he added: “Lancashire is just too big to respond to the needs of people in places like Bacup which is nowhere near to people they’re trying to speak to in Preston”
In response to the struggles, Lancashire County Council has engaged three agencies to bring in the educational psychologists the authority needs.
But while Jenna was full of praise for the efforts Lily’s initial mainstream school made to support her, she had nothing positive to say about Lancashire County Council
She said: “My experience of Lancashire County Council has been horrendous - that might sound strong but I’m only being honest. Every time I’ve needed anything I’ve had to chase repeatedly - they don’t get back to you. You can’t speak to anyone on the phone so you’re waiting on emails and the school has struggled to get them to look at it too.
“We want these children to have a voice and we want them to be heard. They aren’t being heard, they’re at home and missing out when they should be learning.
“We need to look at early intervention and these things need to be acted on quicker by specially-trained staff who can identify what needs to be done for children.”
“I just want to see a better future for these children. All you want is for your child to go out into society and have a place and these children don’t have that.”
Lancashire County Council says it has heard the concerns from families and it is responding.
County Cllr Matthew Salter, cabinet member for Education and Skills, Lancashire County Council, said: “We hear and understand the concerns of families – and we know how difficult the wait for support can be.
“As part of the Lancashire SEND Partnership, we’ve made real progress in improving SEND services, but we know there’s more to do.
“We’re committed to continuing that work so children and families get the timely support they need and deserve.”
Cllr Samara Barnes, the Labour representative for Rossendale West at Lancashire County Council, was the only name raised by parents in a positive sense at the demonstration.
“In all honesty, only Samara Barnes has helped me. She’s amazing. She pushed and pushed and without her we wouldn’t have what we have today.”
A parent at County Hall on Monday
She told The Lancashire Lead afterwards: “At Monday’s protest outside County Hall, families came together to make one thing clear: they deserve to be seen, heard, and taken seriously.
“Each pair of shoes told a story of pain, resilience, and time that can never be reclaimed. The families that I have met over the years show great strength and tenacity - but it shouldn’t be such a fight to get the right provision for their children.
“Whilst LCC are beginning to make improvements, we must not lose sight of the fact that so many families have been let down over the years. Progress is welcome, but it’s desperately sad that so many children and families were let down in the first place.”
Their stories
Victoria Walsh, Chorley
“My ten-year-old son has not attended school since aged seven after three years of masking at primary school. The school didn’t see any issues and blamed me even though I knew there was some kind of neurodiversity.
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