When I speak to parents across Aldershot and Farnborough, one issue comes up time and again: how hard it can be to get the right support for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Behind every conversation is a family doing their best for their child, often while navigating a system that feels confusing, slow and, at times, deeply frustrating.
Education should be about helping every child to thrive. But too many parents tell me that instead of support coming early and working smoothly, they find themselves locked in a constant battle just to be heard. That is not right, and it is why SEND reform matters so much to our community.
That is why I recently hosted a SEND roundtable at Bohunt School, bringing together parents from across Aldershot, Farnborough, Yateley, Blackwater and Hawley. The aim was simple: to listen directly to parents about their experience of trying to secure the right support for their children.
I am hugely grateful to everyone who attended and spoke so openly. What parents shared was honest, powerful and, often heartbreaking. Many described how navigating the system can feel overly bureaucratic and adversarial, with families backed into a battle simply to have their concerns taken seriously. Too often, support comes late or only after parents have fought for it. That should never be the experience of families who are already under pressure.
These conversations underline why we desperately need to change the way things are done. Too many families have lost confidence in a system that should be working with them, not against them, and too many children are not getting the outcomes they deserve. We have to do better. With the Government preparing to publish a Schools White Paper setting out proposed reforms to the SEND system, I am determined to make sure the voices of parents in our community help shape that work.
Following the roundtable, I met with the Education Minister, Georgia Gould, to raise directly the concerns shared by local parents. I was clear that reform must be rooted in lived experienceĀ , focused on delivering the right support at the right time, and designed to work for families in practice, not just on paper.
I also want to reassure parents that the legal right to SEND support is not changing. Existing protections will remain. The task now is to improve how support is delivered so families are no longer left battling a system that should be firmly on their side.
We need a SEND system built on early support, strong local provision and genuine partnership between parents, schools and professionals. A system that puts children first, not paperwork. I will continue working to ensure that the experiences of families locally help shape reform nationally, and that SEND reform delivers real and lasting change for children and parents alike.
