EVEN as construction is underway on a new special school in Thurrock, the borough council is making provision to have to send more children with special needs outside local boundaries.

Next week's meeting of the children's services overview and scrutiny committee, which meets on Tuesday, 13 July, will hear that more than 200 children with special educational needs are currently being sent outside Thurrock if they need residential accommodation.

The council has recently undertaken a comprehensive needs analysis focused on the projected increase in the number of children and young people it has to support over the next five years, in part reflecting population growth, which is increasing at a faster rate than in other local authorities.

The report says the council expects that:

• It will see a further increase in the need for support for Speech, Language and Communication Needs (SCLN) particularly for pupils with Autism.
• It will see a further increase in the need for support for children and young people with Moderate Learning Difficulties (MLD), however, much of this need will be met within existing mainstream places and Treetops expansion.
• It will see a further increase in need for support for children and young with social emotional and mental health (SEMH) needs. Some of this increase can be attributed to the Covid 19 pandemic – the council will continue to closely monitor this over the coming year.

Significant concern is being raised about the lack of capacity for residential care in the borough.

Only 74 per cent of placements for specialist residential centres are within 20 miles of the borough. A total of 204 children – 11.3 per cent of local youngsters requiring residential care – are allocated places outside the borough.

The report says: "Where possible we aim to source provision within or close to the borough.

"However, where a child or young person's needs cannot be met in the local area out of borough placements are used. These are generally due to specialist needs and are usually residential placements due to the distance from home.

"This can make it more difficult for these children and young people to feel and be part of their local communities, and to build a peer group of friends that will help to sustain them into adulthood.

"It should be noted however that often the complexity of needs means that there are a limited number of providers able to meet these needs and provision is only available from a few providers who may be based at a distance."

Families face long journeys, in excess of 20 miles to visit their children and placements away from families can leave children vulnerable.

Portfolio holder for children's services, Cllr Barry Johnson says: "Of course we as an authority would prefer to keep all children and young people near to home wherever possible but as the report suggests it is the complexity of the need that dictates where a child or young person can receive the most suitable provision and sadly that is not always right here in Thurrock.

"However, the SEND improvement board of which I am part, will drive our thoughts and processes for ensuring we provide the very best outcome whilst leaving no stone unturned in attempting to offer those more complex provisions as near to Thurrock as possible."