Agenda item

The Leader invited Mrs Marta Garcia de la Vega to come forward and make her representations to the meeting.

Mrs Marta Garcia de la Vega addressed the Cabinet as a parent, carer and founder representative of SendPACT a local parent group, working to support SEND families in the borough. She was speaking to oppose the agreement of the contract award for the provision of SEND Transport Transformation Consultancy Services at agenda item 7. She was also speaking from her experience as a parent carer and user of SEND transport. In Mrs Garcia de la Vega’s view , prior to 2015, the SEND transport service had been working well in the borough but after the reforms to the SEND transport were taken forward in post 2015, that issues had been arising. Mrs Marta Garcia de la Vega felt that instead of reductions in the funding envelope for this service area, it needed more investment to support SEND children.

Mrs Garcia de la Vega spoke about the general lack of consultation with parents about changes to the SEND transport service and wanted evidence of this past consultation mentioned in the report. She questioned the potential impact of providing a gainshare for a private company for supporting this transport service and what this would mean for the provision. In her view this seemed to be a private business making profit from helping the Council make savings to the SEND transport service. The agreement of this contract implied this, which was worrying for her as SEND service user. She further questioned how a service can be improved by making a 20% cut in the budget.

She referred to the political beliefs of the Cabinet and to their local commitment to not privatising services and also to their vow to involve the community in their decision making. She asked that they uphold these principles and ensure that parents were consulted on changes to the SEND transport service and included in the matters that affect their children. Mrs Garcia de la Vega wanted her deputation to be considered as an intervention and reminder to uphold these principles and position.

In response to questions from Councillors, Chandwani, Ibrahim, Amin, and James, the deputation, Mrs Marta Garcia de la Vega, responded and advised the following:

• A new policy concerning SEND transport reforms had been drafted in late 2015 and been subject to consultation with parents who were not happy with the draft as it did not reflect their experiences or struggles. A final policy was subsequently released not taking forward any of the parents’ concerns previously raised. In 2016 there were many difficulties experienced with the SEND transport service and concerns expressed. The process for accessing transport changed in 2017 and now included a 10-page form for completion which was not easily completed and required many supporting documentation. This was only available online and not felt to be an inclusive way of submitting information to the Council. Many parents of SEND children did not have time to do this. Mrs Garcia de la Vega was further concerned about budget reductions and speculated whether this was the reason behind her son’s special school reducing the number of buses available, from nine to seven.

• Mrs Garcia de la Vega advised that she had not been aware of the proposal to award a contract for the provision of SEND Transport Transformation Consultancy Services and was not consulted on this and had no evidence of this consultation to refer to. The SendPACT group had only been engaged with the Council’s Fairness Commission and provided evidence related to SEND children’s data. There had not been any consultation about the transport services involving her group which was active in the community and they had not seen any evidence to suggest that there had been a consultation.

• In response to the gainshare element of the contract, the deputation felt that the money that could potentially be accrued by the contractor, was better directed to the overall SEND service for use on therapies and access to support and respite care.

• There was a current lack of customer care for SEND parents using the service and there was no foreseeable change in the services being carried out. Children and parents were still waiting too long for improvements to take place and urgent improvements were needed.

• Transparent consultation was essential and Mrs Garcia de la Vega had met with the manager for SEND in July and this potential contract award was not mentioned. In the deputation’s view, a robust consultation involved: holding events on this subject, compiling a report and involving parents and carers in the completion of these polices. The deputation remarked that having a widespread survey could help with this and the Send PACT group had experience of doing this. The Council could use the group to help organise the events and help join up parents, helping obtain a majority view on the changes for the service going forward. The group tried to reach as many parents as it could and were a good source of opinion and advice for the Council.

• The deputation wanted to see the contract stopped and the change process started again. It was accepted the need to assess efficiency but also include parents in the community on these exercises. The deputation was happy to meet and take this co – production process forward and advocated a committee dedicated for this task, involving parent’s carers and professionals.

• The consequences of taking forward this key decision could be damaging to the rapport of the Council with parents.

• The draft SEND transport policy that had begun to be developed in 2015 related to helping independence and facilitating mobility. The current policy was suggesting parents were responsible for taking children to school but failed to indicate that SEND  children  are part of the eligible criteria and the Council is responsible for providing them with transport. It was worrying that this was not included.

The Leader asked the Cabinet Member for Children and Families to respond to the issues raised in the deputation.

The Cabinet Member thanked Mrs Garcia de la Vega for her representations, and added that the transport policy for 2015 is what the Council wanted to change and there was consensus for this, as well as a desire to improve services.

The Cabinet Member spoke about the evidence heard at the Scrutiny Panel meetings on the improvements required to SEND transport, emphasising that there were a difficult set of logistical circumstances to get right to ensure that this service runs smoothly and efficiently for parents and children. The company that had been successful in this bid had done this work in many authorities.

The Cabinet Member underlined that this was not a privatisation but bringing in a new organisational culture and better way of working for this service. There would be 4 levels of accountability so that the work of the preferred bidder was continually held to account and changes considered by stakeholders, including the Cabinet Member herself who would also sit on the steering group to have close interaction with parents and carers.

It was noted that SEND transport for children is governed by statutory guidance and the Council will always need to adhere to this statutory framework. The scoping review undertaken had shown that there was a need to improve this service. The scoping review had involved 50 parents and two special schools and apologies were provided  by the Cabinet Member that Mrs Garcia de la Vega was not amongst those who had given their views and opinions about the current service.

The Director for Children’s Service further thanked the deputation for her representations and added that the issues raised were making the case for change. The decision put forward to Cabinet was to enable this change with the support of the transformation partner with expertise in this area. There were many aspects of the SEND service that needed change and it was essential that the service was able to make these changes.

It was important to note that Children Services was passionate about making changes across the SEND service and SEND transport was only one aspect of the change required. The scoping review had indicated that SEND transport should be one of the initial priority areas explored and meetings had been held with parents, carers and schools to ascertain the aspects of this service that required attention.

It was not disputed that there were live issues with this service area, and there would be a four level assurance process including consultation with parents and carers, the Cabinet Member and Officers, meeting the high level of co – production required to take these required improvements forward.

It was noted that 70% of the work of the transformation partner on SEND transport included improving efficiency of the service, not changing eligibility for transport access. The Council were currently paying £1 extra per mile than it needed for this service so there were savings that could be taken forward that do not adversely impact on the level of service.

The policy recommendations concerning SEND transport associated with the clarity of the service would progress through the 4 levels of assurance mentioned above so there would be a full co – production, consultation process taken forward.

The Cabinet Member further offered Mrs Marta Garcia de la Vega a meeting to talk through any further issues.

The Leader thanked Mrs Garcia De la Vega for her representations.