Hundreds of pupils with SEND were excluded or suspended from Somerset schools last year, while more than 2,500 children were being educated at home, council papers show.

Somerset Council is now preparing a major SEND reform plan for the Government, with ministers requiring the authority to submit it by Friday, 19 June 2026.

Council data cited in the equality impact assessment says 151 pupils were permanently excluded from Somerset state-funded schools in 2024/25. Of those, 100 had identified special educational needs and disabilities.

The same assessment says 3,568 pupils received at least one suspension in 2024/25, including 1,860 with identified SEND.

At the end of December 2025, there were 2,518 children in elective home education in Somerset.

The assessment also says 2,229 pupils were severely absent during 2024/25, meaning they missed at least half of their possible school sessions.

Somerset Council says its reform plan is intended to help more children and young people with SEND succeed in local mainstream schools, backed by a more confident workforce and stronger links between education, health and care services.

The plan is also tied to a major financial package. If it is approved by the Department for Education, Somerset could receive a High Needs Stability Grant worth up to £94.940m.

What the plan is meant to change

The updated report says Somerset's ambition is to support "significantly more" children and young people with SEND in high-quality local mainstream provision.

It says the council wants to reduce reliance on crisis intervention, specialist placements and statutory processes.

By the end of 2028/29, the council says progress should be shown through clear improvements in outcomes.

Those include fewer children and young people with SEND experiencing crisis indicators such as severe absence, exclusion, elective home education, being not in education, employment or training, or entering care.

The plan also aims to reduce the attainment gap for pupils with SEND at key stage two and key stage four, with year-on-year improvement from the 2026/27 cohort onwards.

The council also wants complaints and tribunals to fall over successive years, which it says would show increased parental confidence in the system.

Another goal is to reduce the average cost per EHCP by cutting reliance on high-cost independent provision.

Three building blocks

The report says the proposed delivery programme is built around three themes.

The first is helping children regulate their emotions.

The second is creating calmer learning environments and experiences for children and young people.

The third is building a more confident system, with a stronger workforce and better partnership working.

The reforms would also be aligned with the Families First Partnership Programme, Best Start in Life and the neighbourhood health agenda.

The council says that alignment should help provide clearer support for children, young people and families.

More specialist help for schools

A key part of the plan is the Experts at Hand offer.

This would expand access to specialist roles such as educational psychology, occupational therapy and speech and language therapy.

The updated report says the programme will have significant workforce implications, with a multi-year expansion of expertise in key areas.

Somerset is either the employer for some of those roles, or commissions expertise from the NHS.

The council says the expansion will be funded directly by the Department for Education.

However, the report says further co-production will be needed over the coming months to make sure workforce development is effective and that access meets local needs.

It also warns that demand and competition for specialist staff could affect job market rates.

The financial risk

The SEND plan is central to Somerset Council's wider financial position.

The report says the Dedicated Schools Grant deficit is one of the council's highest-rated risks because of its scale and because national legal duties driving overspending are not expected to be changed until 2030 at the earliest.

If the plan is approved, the High Needs Stability Grant would fund up to 90% of Somerset's DSG deficit built up by 31 March 2026.

That grant is calculated at £94.940m, based on the 2025/26 outturn.

Somerset Council would have to fund the remaining 10% from its general fund. The report says this is forecast to be £10.549m.

That money has been set aside from 2025/26 underspends and held in an unusable reserve until the statutory override expires.

The report says the grant is expected to be paid from autumn 2026 if the SEND Reform Plan is approved.

If the plan is not agreed in the first round, the council warns there could be a delay in receiving the grant. That could lead to increased borrowing, debt interest and uncertainty over when the money would arrive.

The council says it is working to secure first-round approval.

Deficits still forecast

The report warns that there are still no full details of later phases of support for deficits that build up in 2026/27 and 2027/28.

It says the Government will confirm further support before the end of the statutory override in March 2028.

But the council says there remains a critical financial risk for 2026/27 and 2027/28.

The first draft SEND Reform Plan forecasts a deficit of £57.592m for 2026/27 and £63.732m for 2027/28.

The report says work is ongoing to finalise those forecasts.

Somerset's existing Dedicated Schools Grant Deficit Management Plan was agreed by Full Council in September 2025.

The updated report says projects from that plan, the benefits achieved and forecast savings are being updated and formally incorporated into the SEND Reform Plan.

Consultation and scrutiny

The report says the plan has been developed with a wide range of partners.

That includes Somerset Integrated Care Board, the wider ICB cluster covering seven local authority areas, Somerset Parent Carer Forum, schools, SENDIASS, multi-academy trust chief executives, early years representatives, alternative provision providers and pupil referral units.

Children and young people were also involved through groups including the Youth Parliament, Somerset in Care Council, Somerset Leaving Care Council and the Unstoppables Youth Group.

The Children and Families Scrutiny Committee considered the draft plan on 20 April 2026.

An extraordinary scrutiny meeting was arranged for 1 June, ahead of the Executive meeting on 3 June.

Scrutiny members asked for assurance that the plan had been drafted with the local SEND partnership through wide-ranging co-production and engagement.

Legal and safety concerns

The report also raises concerns about legal capacity.

It says Somerset Council does not currently have internal legal resource for SEND legal work.

A locum solicitor was recruited after funding became available for a full-time post, but the report says that person left after just over a month.

SEND legal work will be outsourced until the council is able to recruit.

The report says the volume of SEND legal work, including a very high number of tribunal cases relating to SEND and EHCPs, means additional legal capacity will be needed.

It says Legal Services will need funding for two senior lawyer-level posts.

The report also links unmet SEND need with wider community safety concerns.

It says a Joint Targeted Area Inspection into the multi-agency response to serious youth violence in Somerset identified risks linked to the high proportion of children not in school because of part-time timetables and placement breakdown.

Both can be consequences of unmet SEND need, the report says.

The council also monitors health and safety incidents affecting staff in local authority-maintained schools.

The report says injuries to school-based staff caused by pupil dysregulation are now being recorded as a new and growing category.

What happens next

The SEND Reform Plan is a national requirement.

The report says no other options were identified because Somerset must submit the plan by 19 June 2026 to access the High Needs Stability Grant.

The plan will be assessed by the Department for Education.

If approved, grant payments are expected during the 2026/27 financial year, subject to the council meeting the conditions of its local SEND reform plan.

The council says progress will be tracked through a new governance structure, shared performance framework, system-wide dashboards, SEND performance reporting and regular feedback from parent carers and children and young people.

What the changes will mean for individual Somerset schools, families and children is not yet fully clear.

That will depend on the final plan agreed with government, the funding conditions attached and the detailed delivery work that follows.

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