DfE Update – Delivering better value for SEND and Safety Valve

The NNPCF are engaged in many streams of work with the Department for Education.  

As well as the longer-term changes like the SEND Green Paper and Schools’ Bill, we have been emphasising the need for work that changes things here and now for SEND families – we cannot wait years for new legislation.  

One of the workstreams is the Delivering Better Value in SEND (DBVS) which looks at the local area, with a focus on what services the local authority is providing and where. It looks at how well the local authority are meeting the needs of the families and where the gaps are. It focuses on the inefficiencies within the local area systems and try to get the local area function better.  

In doing so, it will influence the high needs deficit, as often they are running at a high overspend, with very little outcome for the families that they money should be supporting. 

Guidance for this intervention work has been issued and can be seen here 

Safety Valve 

Safety Valve is dealing with the top 20 local authorities who have the highest deficit. Work on this has been ongoing since 2020-21. The programme supports local authorities through a process with financial and SEND expert advisers. Together, local authorities set out proposals to the Department for Education (DfE), setting out how quickly they will reform their services to run them sustainably. 

We do not sit on the board dealing with Safety Valve; however, we are receiving feedback from forums who are part of this programme, and it is very mixed messages of involvement. 

The DfE have released data on 14 out of the 20 local authorities, the data can be found here: https://bit.ly/3UTH7Q7 

Delivering Better Value for SEND 

DBVS is a programme designed to identify local and national opportunities to improve outcomes for children and young people with SEND. 

The programme is being led by Newton Europe and the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) https://bit.ly/3SNsfku and those leading on it say that in order to achieve the fundamental objective of improving outcomes it must:

• have the child and young person at the centre of what they do 
• listen to the challenges from the perspective of those receiving support from the system 
• collaborate with LA’s that border, service partners and children and their families 
• funding is a challenge and should be considered throughout the planning 

The programme focuses on two key approaches.  

Firstly, the short-term help, can they identify sustainable changes in each local authority, that can drive high quality outcomes for children and young people with SEND. 

Secondly, building an objective evidence base. The data will be then used to inform future policy, as well as to build and show best practice that can be shared nationally and inform future national programmes. 

PCFs should be part of this work and if you know work has begun and you have not had a conversation with the DBVS team, speak to your local authority contact. If conversations still have not happened after doing so, please speak to your DfE advisor and your NNPCF regional representative. 

55 local authorities have been approached for this programme. The programme is working in waves and tranches.  

Each local authority area has been designated a wave and tranches have been designated as to what workstream the local authority will be starting. 

The programme for tranche one has begun, with tranche two starting February 2023 and tranche three starting August 2023 

The whole programme will end April 2024. 

The tranches are set out below: 

Tranche 1 are the following local authority’s: 

Kensington & Chelsea, Southampton, Solihull, Dudley, Somerset, Hampshire, Stockton – on- Tees, Doncaster, Oxfordshire, Brent, BCP, Cheshire East, Bracknell Forest, South Tyneside, Cumbria, Suffolk, Stockport, NE Lincs, Bristol and Leicestershire. 

Tranche 2 are the following local authority’s: 

Newham, Sefton, East Riding Yorks, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Enfield, Redcar & Cleveland, Middlesborough, Hackney, Reading, West Sussex, Worcestershire, Windsor & Maidenhead, Oldham, Rochdale, Kingston-u-Hull, Rutland, Havering, Tameside and Swindon 

Tranche 3 are the following local authority’s: 

Tower Hamlets, Warwickshire, Durham, Thurrock, West Berkshire, Halton, Lewisham, Sunderland, Wirral, Birmingham, St.Helens, N.Yorkshire, Buckinghamshire, Cornwall and Central Bedfordshire. 

The work is set out in modules:  

Module 1 (baselines & forecasts) This is used to build a baseline and forecast.  

Module 2 (root cause diagnostics) is about diagnostics with detailed analysis, with cases being reviewed and deep dives. 

Module 3 (implementation planning) Ensuring that the LA can practically implement the suggested solutions to the root causes discovered in Module 2. 

Module 4 is titled transitions with an opportunity to apply for a grant at the end of the programme. This an opportunity for local authority’s to securing funding to deliver the plan. 

Each local authority should involve PCF’s and there will be a DBV Diagnostic set up pack available to you at the start of the conversations. This pack clearly sets out when each module will begin and end for you.