Education and Skills Bill

I want briefly to express my support for these amendments, and I have added my name to Amendment No. 170. We should remind ourselves that young people with special educational needs form a high proportion of those who drop off the edge of the world, so to speak, at the age of 16. They end up as NEETs, living rough and in the courts, and generally they form a specific group in need of special support and encouragement which I hope a revivified Connexions service can give. When the Minister responds, I hope that he will address particularly the issue of young people with SEN because as they get older they also form a very high proportion of the prison population and exhibit many other severe social problems.