My Lords, this has been a wide-ranging, constructive, informed and thoughtful debate. There has been a focus in these amendments on the accountability of the local offer; they consider the issue of inspection; and some of them seek to place in the Bill requirements for minimum standards in the local offer. The noble Lord, Lord Low, referred to accountability, consistency and quality, and those themes ran through the debate.
On Amendment 111, the noble Lords, Lord Low and Lord Ramsbotham, raised the issue of whether the local offer should be inspected by the Care Quality Commission and Ofsted. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, indicated that he was thinking widely around this area, as did other noble Lords. We certainly believe that accountability to parents and young people will be improved by the transparency which the local offer will bring, with the direct involvement of children and young people with SEN and their parents in shaping and reviewing it.
We recognise the importance of joint working between clinical commissioning groups and local authorities in developing the services in the local offer. We understand the views that have been expressed about the value of external inspection in relation to accountability, a major theme of the debate. I would point out that the democratic accountability that local authorities must face is one element of the issue. We have heard what noble Lords have said and I hope that they will be pleased that we have asked Ofsted to study and report on how best to identify best practice in preparing for SEN reforms—a fact picked up by the noble Baroness, Lady Morris—and to consider particularly whether there is a need for an inspection framework to drive improvements. Ofsted will link with the CQC in this work and I hope that noble Lords will welcome that. We will flag this debate to those organisations because it will help to focus minds and inform them.
I hope noble Lords will agree that, at this point, we should not place a requirement to inspect on either the CQC or Ofsted until we have the findings of that study. Once the survey is complete, I assure noble Lords that we will reflect upon its implications and on whether an inspection regime is necessary.
The noble Lord, Lord Low, and others are right to say that we would not wish to be over-prescriptive. There was a wide-ranging debate about the pros and cons of that approach. We want the local offer to encourage local authorities to be innovative, develop a sense of partnership with local children, young people and families, and reflect local need. I thank my noble friends Lady Eaton and Lord Storey, and the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, for their understanding and support on that perspective. I certainly found very encouraging the reports that we heard the other day from the pathfinders on the different, imaginative approaches they take to this area. I hope that noble Lords who were not at that meeting will have an opportunity to hear more about that.
Some noble Lords referred to minimum standards. I can tell the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, that indeed we feel that minimum standards could weaken parents’ and young people’s ability to influence their local authority and provide local accountability. As other
noble Lords indicated, local authorities could simply point to the fact that they have met the minimum standard and that would be that. There could indeed be a race to the bottom, which we must avoid. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, that we want a race to the top.
On Amendment 113, I recognise the good intentions of my noble friends Lady Brinton and Lady Walmsley in terms of the format of the local offer in the Bill. Again, I stress that transparency and accessibility are key themes of the local offer and we agree that a level of consistency will help with that. The local offer regulations and chapter 5 of the code of practice, in our view, provide a common framework to secure consistency. I know that noble Lords recognise that and debated whether it was really the case but we feel it provides a common framework so that families have the information they need to make comparisons between local authorities. Noble Lords may wish to look specifically at page 44 of the new code of practice, which lists what a local offer must include. However, we deliberately did not require a specific format for the local offer because we want to see local people shape each one, including the format it should take. We have already seen this happening on the ground, as illustrated in what the pathfinders said.
On the review that my noble friend Lady Brinton referred to, I point her to page 57 of the code of practice, which says:
“Local authorities must publish their response to those comments in the local offer alongside an explanation of what action they are taking to respond”.
That rather puts them on the spot in terms of criticisms made of them and how they deal with those. Bearing in mind that they are locally accountable to the electorate, it will obviously act as a pressure upon them.
There is clearly widespread agreement that the local offer is a major step forward. We welcome that and thank noble Lords for their emphasis of that. We hear what noble Lords said about how this is best delivered and the variation in approach to how it might be done. I hope that I have reassured the noble Lord and that he will be content at this stage to withdraw his amendment, noting the study that I referred to in my opening remarks.