(England) Councils will run up $24B SPED debt by 2030 "due to increasing numbers"

Nov 14, 2025, Guardian: Special needs services in England face ‘total collapse’ from increasing demand

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/nov/14/special-educational-needs-services-schools-england-collapse

Special educational needs services in England face “total collapse”, with councils on course to have run up debts of £18bn [$24B] by the end of the decade as a result of increasing numbers of children requiring extra teaching support in schools.

Without urgent structural reform of the system, the cost of accelerating demand for special educational needs and disability (Send) support could push about 59 upper-tier authorities into effective bankruptcy by March 2028, councils have warned.

The government is now preparing long-delayed and potentially controversial changes to the system aimed at putting a lid on rising spending while meeting the specialist needs of more children within the mainstream schools system.

A report published on Friday by the County Councils Network (CCN) called on ministers to write off councils’ accumulated Send debts alongside legislative changes and reforms to Send appeal tribunals to reduce access to specialist support. Parents would fiercely oppose such changes. . . .

Surging numbers of EHCPs – which in theory guarantee suitable levels of educational support for individual children – have forced councils increasingly to rely on private specialist schools, some owned by private equity investors, to meet demand.

The CCN report estimates that 34,000 pupils are in special schools at an annual average annual cost per place of £72,000, far higher than the average yearly cost per place of £10,000 in mainstream schools.

A comprehensive survey of English councils using freedom of information requests carried out by the Guardian earlier this year revealed councils’ total forecast accumulated Send deficits at the end of March 2025 was £3.2bn [$4.2B], rising swiftly to £5.2bn [$6.8B] by the end of March 2026.

The survey carried out for the CCN report estimates that councils’ total accumulated deficit would rise to £6.6bn [$8.7B ]by the end of March 2026, £13.4bn [$18B] by the end of March 2028, and £18bn [$24B] a year later, suggesting an even more rapid rise in Send spending above the level of funding provided by government. . . .