Debate contribution: Special Educational Needs and Disability: Investment and Transformation

Debate contribution by Ms Cara Hunter on 26 February 2024.

MLA

Ms Cara Hunter

Party at the time

Social Democratic and Labour Party

Date

26 February 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Special Educational Needs and Disability: Investment and Transformation

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4231203

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I welcome the opportunity to speak on the motion. I am rarely an angry person, but this is an issue that I am deeply unhappy about. I see it every day and every week in my constituency office, and it is heartbreaking. The dire need for more special educational needs support is an urgent and pressing matter that demands our collective attention and immediate action. We must listen to and learn from parents and caregivers in our communities, teachers, classroom assistants and health professionals to ensure that we create an equitable, sustainable change for all children with special educational needs. I have been to Rossmar School in Limavady, in my constituency, and have spoken to staff, parents and families there. It is such a positive learning environment for our young people. However, the lack of investment and funding mean that there are so many challenges. Thank God for the good staff who support so many young people. In my time in politics, this issue has often come to my office. Parents and families feel unheard and that they are entirely ignored by the system. Children with special educational needs being unable to get school places has created much stress for families. Pupils are unable to attain the transport that they need to get to school or to socialising opportunities. They often experience long waiting lists for speech therapy or health appointments to improve their quality of life, well-being and overall development. Our children face significant challenges, including inequitable access to education, inappropriate placements and countless systemic failures. We in the SDLP believe that the time for action is now. We call upon the Minister of Education to prioritise SEN reform, ensuring that every child, without exception, has the opportunity to reach their full potential in our education system here. We support the motion and the amendment, and I welcome the fact that it includes the dire need for more investment and support for the key year when SEN pupils transition from an education setting into society.

I have spoken with worried parents who have a child with learning difficulties, and they have touched on the fact that their child goes to a special school five days a week but that, after their time in school has finished, there will be barely any support in adulthood. There are gaps in group activities, which can lead to social isolation, but, thankfully, in my constituency, I have seen a number of groups, such as Destined in Feeny and Causeway Neurodiversity, that do an incredible job of filling those gaps and providing a sense of community for those with special educational needs. They are just brilliant. I thank the parents at SEN Reform NI who have come together to work on the issue and who have shared their lived experiences. They have highlighted how vast the issue is and how dire the need and urgency are to fix it. If we look at the statistics, we see that they are absolutely staggering. Last August, 149 children with special educational needs and complex learning needs were left without a school. Let us be clear: that can never happen again. It is on each and every one of us. I am not a parent yet, but it is absolutely heartbreaking. Pat rightly said that children with special educational needs are not second-class citizens, so let us not treat them as such. We know that almost 20% of our school population has a special educational need, so why are we not investing in those students? Why are we not supporting them and investing in their futures? Why are we not building sufficiently sized buildings to support their complex needs?

I thank the Member for his intervention. Absolutely. I recognise that, as we sit here today, so many pupils and families are waiting on assessments. We know that they will only add to the number of children with special educational needs, so the expansion of those buildings is necessary. The present situation is marked by these systemic shortcomings: the inadequate capacity of our special schools, which I mentioned; limited access to education for children with special educational needs; and the delays and uncertainties surrounding assessments, which is a massive issue that I come across all the time. The pressure that that puts on the family setting can be extremely difficult to deal with. One issue that Mr McCrossan loves to touch on — I share his enthusiasm — is the lack of accountability in the Education Authority. That will be really interesting to consider over the coming months when we dive a little deeper into how we can best support our children with special educational needs. I welcome the opportunity to look into that further. I thank ADD-NI, which I met last week to talk about the lack of investment in support services for children in Northern Ireland who have ADHD. We looked at how the lack of investment by our trusts in ADHD support and the lack of available support services can cause a lot of difficulty for pupils and lead to a lot of mental health issues. We must address those challenges, and we must start today. We in the SDLP stand firm in our call for immediate action to address the systemic failings in the sector. Every child, regardless of who they are, their diagnosis or where they come from, deserves a well-funded, well-supported journey through education to support them and enable them to fulfil their potential. I urge the Education Minister today, as I do at any given opportunity, to conduct the urgent review as soon as possible.

934 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 09:43 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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