The mother of a boy with autism is fighting to stop plans for more than £20m in cuts to special needs services in Surrey.
Alicia McColl, whose 14-year-old son Kian Hollow has autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), has crowdfunded a legal challenge.
Alicia McColl with son Kian: she is crowdfunding to stop Surrey Council slashing special needs spending
Range of cuts in Surrey
Surrey plans a range of cuts to its 2017/18 budget. Among these are to slash £2.3m from special schools and £1.5m from transport. It also plans to chop £1m from post-16 services and £1m from early years support.
Project Management officer McColl, 44, from Farnham in Surrey, fears she is already feeling the impact of the cuts.
The authority wants to review Kian’s education, health and care plan in the summer. It only completed the plan in January.
Fear over planned review
McColl fears Surrey will try to end a commitment to one-to-one support for her son during the review.
She said cuts to early years could “really impact” on children’s experiences at school because it is “such an important” period.
McColl wants lawyers Irwin Mitchell to begin a judicial review to ensure Surrey’s final decision is lawful.
She wants families directly impacted by the cuts to contact her to help strengthen the legal challenge.
‘Steep rise’ in numbers
Surrey County Council said money from central government has not kept pace with a “steep rise” in the numbers of children with special needs.
Though funding has risen, cost pressures are “outstripping the increase”, a spokesperson added.
A spokesperson from the Department for Education said: “Our priority is putting the needs of families at the heart of the special educational needs system. That is why we have introduced the biggest reforms to special educational needs and disability support in a generation and introduced Education, Health and Care plans, that are tailored to the needs of the child or young person and will be available to over 250,000 people by March 2018.
“We have given councils £223m extra funding to help them introduce these reforms successfully and a further £60m to fund independent supporters in every local authority to help families to navigate the system.
“We are beginning to see positive feedback as a result of the new system, with 73 per cent of parents and young people saying that they are now getting the help that they needed.”
Exceeded original target
McColl started fundraising for her legal challenge last Monday (5 March). By Thursday she had already exceeded her original target of £2,600.
If your family is directly affected by the cuts you can email McColl at this address: SurreySENbudgetcuts@gmail.com
Click here for a link to McColl’s crowdfunding page.
Related:
- Education still failing kids with autism
- £5,500 cut cor families with disability
- Children’s social care ‘in crisis’
- Parents speak out over lack of support
Published: 11 March 2018
