On 23 February 2026, the Department for Education published its long-awaited SEND reform package. This is the most significant overhaul of special educational needs and disabilities provision in England since the Children and Families Act 2014. At Mime, we work closely on SEND with local authorities, schools and charities, so we’ve been following this closely. This post sets out the government’s plans, what’s changing, and what it means in practice.
The headline ambition is a shift away from what the government sees as a reactive, diagnosis-led, adversarial and fragmented system, towards one that is preventative, inclusive, and focused on earlier intervention. That direction of travel is broadly positive. But the devil, as always, is in the detail…and in the funding.
The five principles behind the reforms
The government has been speaking about its five key principles for reform for a while now. These are worth understanding because they are the logical underpinning for the proposed changes:
1. Early: needs should be identified and supported sooner, to improve outcomes and prevent escalation into more costly provision.
2. Local: children and young people with SEND should, where possible, learn in their local school. Special schools continue, but for those with the most complex needs.
3. Fair: schools should be properly resourced to meet common and predictable needs, without families having to fight for support. Where specialist provision is needed, there will be clear legal requirements and safeguards.
4. Effective: reforms should be grounded in data and evidence, with all interventions grounded in effective practice.
5. Shared: education, health and care services should work in genuine partnership with families, teachers, experts and representative bodies.
These principles are sensible. The challenge, as it always is with SEND, is translating them into a system that consistently delivers for children and families on the ground.
A new tiered framework
The government plans to replace the existing two-level approach (SEN Support and EHCPs) with a new three-tier framework sitting above universal provision:
- Targeted: children and young people receive support from their setting, set out in an Individual Support Plan (ISP) developed with parents.
- Targeted Plus: support from the setting, with input from education and health professionals. This level of support may include access to a ‘Support Base’.
- Specialist: children and young people receive support through an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP), if they require provision set out in one of the new nationally defined Specialist Provision Packages.
In practice, this seems likely to mean that EHCPs, which currently covers a wide range of children with complex needs, will be reserved only for those requiring the top tier of support: needs that cannot be met in a mainstream classroom.
What changes for EHCPs specifically?
This is where things get contentious. Currently, EHCPs are individualised plans for all children with complex needs, regardless of the type of provision they are in. They are rarely ceased before age 18. Under the reforms, EHCPs will likely be:
- More restricted in scope: only for those who require Specialist-tier support
- Templated and standardised: based on nationally defined Specialist Provision Packages rather than bespoke to the individual
- Reviewed at key phase transitions rather than maintained as a continuous entitlement
For many families who currently rely on an EHCP as a legal safeguard, this is a significant and worrying shift. The new Individual Support Plans (ISPs), that will be in place for those at the Targeted and Targeted Plus tiers, will be reviewed annually and will be subject to Ofsted inspection. However, while ISPs will be challengeable by families, and the DfE has spoken about independent adjudication and mediation mechanisms, they are not expected to be legally enforceable.
What changes for mainstream schools?
Mainstream schools are asked to take on significantly more responsibility under these reforms. Key changes include:
- Individual Support Plans replacing the current informal SEN Support, with annual reviews and Ofsted scrutiny
- All secondary schools will be required to have Inclusion Bases, which will encompass existing Resourced Provision and SEN Units, as well as more informal provision
- Schools will become the primary deliverer of SEND provision, supported by embedded specialist professionals through a new “Experts at Hand” model, rather than relying on external services and individualised EHCP funding
This is a big ask for mainstream schools, particularly given existing workforce pressures. The government’s answer is significant investment…more on that below.
What changes for local authorities?
Local authorities currently sit at the centre of the SEND system, assessing needs, issuing and maintaining EHCPs, commissioning provision, and acting as the main accountability body. Under the reforms, they will shift to a more strategic and oversight role across a local partnership, with less direct involvement in individual cases (as role of EHCPs narrows). This is a major cultural and structural shift for local authority SEND teams. As an example, local authorities are being asked to lead the production of Local Area SEND Reform Plans, but are tasked to co-produce these across the local partnership.
What about the £££? Can the money make this work?
The scale of the financial commitment is genuinely significant. The government has committed £7.7bn over three years, split into two themes:
1. £4 billion to meet needs earlier, including:
- £1.6bn Inclusive Mainstream Fund for schools (by 2029/30)
- £1.8bn Experts at Hand (by 2029/30)
- £200m transformation funding for local authorities
- £200m for teacher CPD
- £200m for Best Start Family Hubs
2. £3.7 billion in capital spending (by 2029/30), including:
- 60,000 new specialist SEND places
- New special schools
- Expansion and upgrading of existing provision
- Inclusion bases in mainstream schools
- Specialist facilities and adapted environments
To put this in context: the total annual DfE budget is around £95bn, of which roughly £12bn is for SEND. So this investment represents approximately 3% of the annual total, or around 21% of the SEND budget, assuming it is all spent over three years. It is not a trivial sum, but it is also not unlimited, and the success of the reforms depends heavily on whether this investment translates into real capacity on the ground, not just in time but in the right places.
One important additional measure: the DfE has confirmed it will provide a one-off grant to write off 90% of local authority high needs deficits. For many councils that have been struggling under the weight of structural SEND funding pressures, this is a significant lifeline and a clear recognition that the current system is financially unsustainable.
Data and technology: what this means in practice
Before wrapping up, a word on the data and tech implications. For those of us who work in data and technology in the SEND space, the reforms create both new demands and new opportunities. Key implications include:
- Digital, nationally consistent EHCPs and ISPs. For the first time, there will be a standardised digital format for both plans. This creates the potential for much better data quality and comparability, but also requires significant investment in systems and processes at local level.
- New and more demanding reporting requirements. Local authorities will need to submit an initial Local SEND Reform Plan by June 2026, with quarterly updates thereafter. The plan includes detailed financial forecasting across multiple years and provision types, as well as narrative sections on monitoring and evaluation.
- Better planning capability. The shift to earlier intervention requires better demand forecasting. Local areas need to know where needs will arise and ensuring resources are in the right place at the right time. This is an area where data analytics can make a real difference.
- Joined-up data across local areas. The reforms reinforce the need for data sharing across education, health and care – something that has historically been a significant challenge. New local area partnerships will need shared dashboards and information flows to function effectively.
- New tools for families, including “School Profiles” that will give parents better information about what provision is available locally. Perhaps, this will look something like the profiles we built with Camden Learning…
Final thoughts
The direction of these reforms is clear, and in broad terms, it is a positive vision. The aspiration to build a more preventative, inclusive, and nationally consistent SEND system, rather than one where families have to fight for every piece of support, is a good one. The financial commitment, while not unlimited, is real and substantial.
But there are genuine risks. The reduced legal enforceability of support plans at the Targeted tiers will concern many families. The shift of responsibility onto mainstream schools assumes a level of capacity and expertise that does not yet universally exist. And the success of everything depends on the data, systems and local partnerships being in place to make it work in practice.
At Mime, we specialise in SEND analysis and research. If you’d like to talk about how to prepare your data and reporting capability for the SEND reforms, get in touch.
