My Lords, there has been broad support across this House for our ambition to create a system that raises aspirations and helps young people with SEN to realise their full potential, achieve positive outcomes and prepare for adult life. There has also been broad support for the provisions in the Bill that extend additional rights and support to 16 to 25 year- olds in further education and training.
The Bill enshrines in law the principle that local authorities must take account of young people’s views, wishes and feelings, and involve them in decision-making. It gives young people aged 16 to 25 the right to request an assessment of their needs. It ensures that post-16 institutions will be consulted by the local authority when it reviews its provision, and are included in the local offer. It places FE colleges, sixth form colleges, 16 to 19 academies and free schools under a new duty to use their “best endeavours” for all young people with SEN, and ensures that they have regard to the new nought to 25 code of practice. It gives young people the right to request that these institutions—and approved independent specialist providers—be named in their EHC plan and then admit them, unless exemptions apply. It ensures that young people who become NEET do not lose their EHC support, and are helped back into education. Also, for the first time, it gives 16 to 25 year-olds in further education and training the right to appeal to an SEN first-tier tribunal if they are unhappy with their arrangements. There is a great deal here that we should be proud of and I am grateful for the support that noble Lords have shown on all sides of the House.
However, I also know that there has been genuine concern about the provisions in the Bill that require local authorities to “have regard to” the age of young people aged 19 to 25 when determining their support. We had a particularly helpful round-table discussion on this when a number of noble Lords, including my noble friends Lady Sharp and Lady Cumberlege and the noble Baronesses, Lady Hughes and Lady Howarth, made a number of really helpful comments in this regard. Noble Lords have particularly expressed their fears that the Bill as currently drafted would provide local authorities with an excuse to deny or cease support to a young person based solely on their age. This is not, and has never been, our intention. Young people with SEN aged 19 to 25 should be supported to remain in formal education where this will enable them to complete or consolidate their learning, achieve their outcomes and make a successful transition to adulthood. In achieving this important aim we must not inadvertently create an entitlement or expectation that all young people with SEN remain in education until age 25. That would not be in the interests of many young people, who may need just one or two years of additional education to progress into adult life and work.
I have listened carefully to the concerns of noble Lords, both during debate in Grand Committee and subsequently. In particular, I have listened to concerns
that the focus on age is unhelpful or unclear in its intention and could lead to support being denied on the basis of a young person’s age alone. I have therefore tabled government amendments to clarify our intention in the Bill. I am pleased to be presenting these amendments with the support of my noble friends Lady Sharp and Lady Cumberlege, who spoke incisively on this issue in Grand Committee.
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The amendments remove the explicit requirement to have regard to a young person’s age, instead requiring local authorities to consider whether a young person aged over 18 needs more time to complete their education when determining whether to make an EHC plan, and whether they have achieved the outcomes specified in their plan before determining that it should end. As ever, local authorities must make that judgment in close consultation with young people, who will have access to mediation and can appeal to the SEN tribunal if they are unhappy with the decision.
I am grateful also to the noble Baronesses, Lady Hughes and Lady Jones, for their amendments seeking to require consideration of “educational progress” rather than age. I am pleased that we have achieved such a degree of consensus. I hope that noble Lords will support my proposed amendments, which represent a very positive improvement to the Bill and reflect the very constructive and helpful debates that we have had in this House. I beg to move.