North Wales Assembly Member Mark Isherwood yesterday questioned the Education Minister over the fact that no educational provision has been made for some children with Autism and special educational needs in North Wales, despite schools having been closed due to Covid-19 for six weeks and promises that this provision would be made.
Mr Isherwood has been contacted by a number of parents who have been unable to access provision for their vulnerable children and, speaking in this week’s virtual Plenary Meeting of the Welsh Parliament, raised the matter with the Education Minister, Kirsty Williams.
Speaking from his home in North Wales via ‘Zoom’, Mr Isherwood said:
“It is now almost 6 weeks since you first advised that schools in Wales should close in response to COVID-19, with the exception of making provision for children who are vulnerable or whose parents are critical to the COVID-19 response. You said that vulnerable children include those with care and support plans and Statements of special educational needs and I commend all the staff on the rotas for this, including my youngest son.
“How do you respond, therefore, to the Probation Officer living in Wrexham who contacted me this morning, whose Autistic son meets the criteria but has not been allowed any educational provision since the start of the crisis because, quote, 'The Headteacher is refusing to open the special provision for disabled children'?
“Or to the Flintshire mother who contacted me last night, whose daughter has severe autism, severe learning disability and ADHD and also meets the criteria, who told me that 'even though we're in our sixth week of lockdown, there's still been no news on when a hub is opening'?”
In her response, the Minister said “the expectation is for all local authorities to provide specialist provision”, and told Mr Isherwood to pass on to her the cases raised with him.
She added: “We are very clear that there should be specialist provision in place to meet the needs of parents, and that has been successfully done in many areas. But also, let us be clear that, even where a child has a Statement of Special Educational Needs and a Care and Support Plan, it may be parental choice for their children not to attend a setting, and, because we're working out of hubs, sometimes that hub model is not appropriate for a child, because they would be faced with, perhaps, a rota of teachers in an unfamiliar setting, which, actually, could be detrimental to their well-being.”
Mr Isherwood added: “In a subsequent email, Flintshire Council told me that screening has ‘now finalised the first wave of allocations of the most high level cases’ and that they ‘are now in a position to consider other learners who may benefit from some hub provision’. However, the Mother concerned there has told me that her daughter’s Social Worker had requested that her daughter be placed on the priority list for the hub a fortnight ago and has told her today that the hub has not opened yet but her daughter is now on the priority list.”
