Thank you very much for contacting me about the Guide Dogs report on children and young people with vision impairment. I understand that it makes a number of recommendations for the Government to consider. As such, I am glad that a number of measures are in place to support children who are visually impaired.]
I believe it is very important that measures are taken to ensure that visually impaired children have all the necessary support in educational settings, and more widely at home. As such, I welcomed that high needs funding, which is specifically for supporting children with more complex SEND, will be increasing by £1 billion during the 2022-23 financial year. This will bring the overall funding for high needs to £9.1 billion, and this unprecedented increase of 13 per cent comes on top of the £1.5 billion increase over the last two years. I understand that decisions about how funding is used, including for the employment of specialist teachers for visually impaired children, are made by local authorities and schools.
In March this year, the Government published its Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Improvement Plan. The Improvement Plan sets out that the Government will establish a single national system that delivers for every child and young person with special educational needs and disabilities from birth to age 25 so that they enjoy their childhood, achieve good outcomes, and are well prepared for their next step, whether that’s employment, higher education or adult services.
The Improvement Plan will help to improve outcomes and improve consistency for children and young people with visual impairments. For example, it includes a commitment to ensure a secure supply of teachers of children and young people with visual, hearing and multi-sensory impairments in both specialist and mainstream settings.
This package forms part of the Government’s significant investment into children and young people with SEND and in AP, with investment increasing by more than 50 per cent, compared with 2019-20, to over £10 billion by 2023-24.