Stephen Byers

Labour Party | North Tyneside

Herald and Post article

Last week I met the Schools Minister Andrew Adonis. He has been a frequent visitor to North Tyneside and was keen to hear about the good progress being made in our schools. I was pleased to be able to give him a positive response.

Andrew is also the Minister with responsibility for children with special educational needs. In North Tyneside we have the excellent Percy Hedley School which does such important work with children that have special educational needs. I had recently visited the school and was briefed on a particular problem which has emerged over the last few years.

Because of its good reputation and the very specialist nature of the service it can offer there are many parents who want their local education authority to place their child at Percy Hedley. However, on an increasing number of occasions the placement request is turned down.

This leads to anger and disappointment to the parent an they then often embark on a long and stressful appeal process.

I discussed with Andrew whether there as a better way of approaching this sensitive issue. One which put the interests of the individual first whilst also recognising the important planning role over education provision to be carried out by the local education authority.

Andrew was very responsive to my request to look again at this whole area. We have excellent schools like Percy Hedley and it is vital that we use their expertise to the full.

The good news is that the Minister is sending one of his top civil servants to the region to look at how things might be improved.

Let’s hope that a mew way forward can be found that will more effectively meet the requirements of children with special educational needs.