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Highland Council chief says ASN service needs to be delivered differently - and funding cuts are not the problem


By Scott Maclennan

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Highland Council chief executive Donna Manson believes the way classroom support is provided needs to change.
Highland Council chief executive Donna Manson believes the way classroom support is provided needs to change.

Highland Council has come in for criticism from parents who say additional support needs cuts are harmful to all children.

A long-awaited report into ASN provision found many vulnerable children’s needs “are not being met”.

The report found 25 per cent of primary school parents and 43 per cent of secondary school parents do not think their children get “the help they need to do well”.

It also recorded 24 per cent of staff reporting that children and young people are not “provided with experiences which meet their learning needs.”

At an education committee meeting council chief executive Donna Manson said that “children are at the heart of what we are doing” and added that the problem was not funding levels – which have risen by 26 per cent between 2012 and 2019 – but the way the service is run.

“We do have a high level of resource and we continue to have levels of resources that should enable us to do a good job,” she said.

But critics have accused the local authority of not listening to concerns some have about the spending cuts and reforms impacting education, something Mrs Manson said was “extremely disappointing” given the level of work that has been put in.

On the consultation exercise which informed the report she said: “Night after night we listened to what parents were saying. We went out and met a couple of hundred parents and listened to children – it would not be appropriate for officers to actually represent those individual stories, but we did listen. We do listen and we actually then work with each other to make sure that we recognise that in our practices.”

Councillor Fiona Robertson said: “I had a child with ASN who went through school and most definitely his needs were not met.

“The report has just backed-up what we have been feeling – we need to look at the whole ASN model because putting money into it is not necessarily working.”

At last week’s education committee chief executive Donna Manson emphatically stated that she had personally listened to both the good and the bad from the consultation.

She insisted the problems with the service was not the level of funding – which has risen by 26 per cent between 2012 and 2019 – but the way it is delivered in schools and that both must change.

Mrs Manson said: “We do in totality have a high level of resource, we do know that we continue in the national summary of statistics have levels that should enable us to do a good job.

“That is why we asked Claire McGonigal to go out and visit every community and listen to families and parents and she would pop into my room at the end of the day and she would share with me what she observed in our schools.

“She would talk to me about the children and parents that she met and evenings that she had and I have to say she described the most fantastic practice that she saw but equally so some nights it was not what we were hoping to hear.

“There were some communities who were finding it very difficult to to support and include out children and young people – and that is the picture when we talk about ASN needs in the Highlands.”

Critics of the local authority’s approach accuse it of not listening to the concerns some have about the spending cuts and reforms.

Mrs Manson said: “It is extremely disappointing to think that, particularly in terms of my own background and training, that we would not listen to everything that came back from what parents were saying.

“As I said, night after night we listened to what parents were saying, we heard stories, just like this week we went out and met a couple of hundred parents and listened to children but it would not be appropriate for officers to actually represent those individual stories but we did listen.

“We do debrief about that, we do listen and we actually then work with each to make sure as listen to that we take cognisance of our practice – because we have got children at the heat of what we do.”

Councillor Fiona Robertson backed the report's findings, saying: "I was focussing very much on the 25 per cent of staff who felt that their learning needs were not being met and the 33 per cent of felt that Highland Council are letting them down by not putting effective strategies in place.

"I had a child with ASN who went through school and most definitely his needs were not met so we have known this for a long time. The report has just backed up what we have been feeling – that we need to look at the whole ASN model because putting money into it is not necessarily working."

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