Academies Bill [Lords]

I hesitate to say that I agree absolutely, but I have great sympathy with the hon. Lady's argument, because the local education authority will have all the educational psychologists and other areas of expertise that are required in these processes. I would question whether the alternative provision exists; indeed, I would go further than that. Everyone who has done a SENDIST case, running it through the myriad reports, will know the tremendous difficulty that exists in obtaining the right level of reports and presentation to push the thing forward. I would suggest that if people have to go to the Secretary of State, things will take much longer and be much more complicated. I return to the point that this is not me rebelling; I am just saying that the assertions of the founder of all these kinds of reforms—Lord Baker of Dorking—was clear at the outset of this process that we should keep it very simple and put the matter to the LEA, because it will be best capable of dealing with it. I accept what the Minister said when clarifying the point approximately 15 minutes ago. He said that there is always a duty to ensure that the needs are met. That is entirely true, but anybody who does SENDIST work will know that there is a parallel duty to perform with the financial resources available. The complication is that there are genuine concerns that the financial resources will not necessarily be available in the processes that are being proposed. That particularly applies where there are special educational needs in more rural areas such as mine, where we have 1,200 square miles to cover, catchment areas the size of the M25 and an ability to provide for those needs, along with the necessary rural transport. However, I have not heard sufficient clarification that those rural transport needs will be accommodated as part of the Bill. Briefly, let me finish by saying that I do not support the amendment, but I hope that we will receive a great deal of further explanation.