Education for All Bill

The Bill is at pre-legislative scrutiny stage: announced in the King's Speech 1 but not introduced. The operative evidence-gathering process is the DfE 'SEND reform: putting children and young people first' consultation 2, supported by the Schools White Paper companion materials 'Every child achieving and thriving' 3. Formal scrutiny is under way via the Education Committee's SEND White Paper inquiry, which took oral evidence on 14 April 2026 4. The Commons Library has published CBP-10550 introducing the package 5 and CBP-9760 contextualising it against the 2023 SEND and Alternative Provision Improvement Plan 6, the immediate predecessor policy frame that was itself launched via WMS HCWS595 in March 2023 7. A heavy run of PQs from April 2026 is probing detail on data, inclusion of specific conditions (e.g. Pathological Demand Avoidance), education-otherwise-than-in-school, the SEND tribunal route and rights to a specialist place. Adjacent statutory architecture is largely in place: the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 has already legislated the schools and children's social care measures the Bill builds on. Existing statutory hooks — Part 3 of the Children and Families Act 2014, the SEND Code of Practice, and DfE procurement guidance on SEND placements 8 — remain the operational baseline until the new Bill is enacted.

The most material recent shifts cluster in March-May 2026. The King's Speech on 13 May 2026 1 formally placed the Bill in the legislative programme alongside the Digital Access to Services Bill. The SEND consultation opened on 27 April 2026 2 is now the document governing what the Bill will look like. On 14 April 2026 the Education Committee held its first oral evidence session on the SEND White Paper 3. Funding scrutiny has intensified: PQs HL14881 and HL15133 press the Government on how £3.5bn additional DfE funding for 2028-29 will be spent and on year-by-year SEND allocations, while PQ 99199 4 probes the plan to absorb SEND costs into DfE's core budget from 2028-29 — the fiscal-credibility hinge of the reform. PQ 122251 5 presses for publication timing and enforcement mechanics for the detailed National Inclusion Standards. The 2023 SEND and AP Improvement Plan remains the immediate predecessor frame against which the Bill will be judged.

Four things matter most over the next twelve months. First, the SEND consultation response — the King's Speech briefing makes Bill content 'subject to' consultation responses 1, so the response document will reveal what survived contact with the sector. Second, the Bill text itself: the headline reforms (National Inclusion Standards, national EHCP template, key-stage rather than annual reviews, SEND tribunal reform, school-level funding pooling) will require detailed drafting choices that affect academies, special schools and LAs differently. Third, the funding profile: the £4bn envelope is announced but year-by-year disaggregation against the 2028-29 absorption point has not been published, and this is the most exposed political flank — the announced figures are headline numbers, not a delivery profile. Fourth, the triple-lock September 2029 reference date 1: this creates a long legacy tail of pre-reform EHCPs and shapes LA placement strategy from now until 2029. Adjacent watch-items include the timing and content of the new SEND Code of Practice (where the staff training mandate sits), the detailed National Inclusion Standards 2, and how the reformed SEND tribunal route will interact with the reduced review frequency — currently parents' main escalation route runs through annual reviews and tribunal appeal, both of which are being changed.

The principal uncertainty is whether the announced £4bn envelope can absorb both the structural reform (Experts at Hand, Inclusion Bases, additional special school places) AND the existing high-needs deficit, especially with the 2028-29 absorption point flagged in PQ 99199 1. A second risk is the silent gap between Bill announcement and Bill text: the King's Speech briefing 2 uses the language of consultation responses shaping content, which means key design choices on the SEND tribunal, fund pooling and Specialist Provision Packages are still open. Inferred from corpus gap: no Government response to the consultation is yet in the readable corpus, no draft Bill clauses are available, and the detailed National Inclusion Standards have not been published 3 — the briefing is therefore drawing on the King's Speech framing and parliamentary scrutiny rather than on legislative text or response documents. Sector and civil-society stakeholder positions (parent groups, special school sector, LA representative bodies) are also under-represented in the retrieved corpus.