The pandemic is “still casting a long shadow” for millions of children, according to a report published today that sets out the scale of childhood vulnerability in England.
The Centre for Young Lives’ (CFYL) annual report examines data on different forms of vulnerability in England, including special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), severe school absence and mental health problems. It warns that currently many vulnerable children are not being identified and supported.
The think tank is calling for a new data dashboard on childhood vulnerability and for government departments to use a single unified definition of childhood vulnerability so that they consider the same data and provide joined-up solutions.
Vulnerable children in need of support
Baroness Anne Longfield, founder of the CFYL, said the report “shines a spotlight on the millions of children growing up with vulnerabilities in England - and how the Covid pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis continue to cast a long shadow over the life chances of many of our children and young people.”
She added: “Over recent years, a scattergun approach, driven by budget cuts and the decimation of early support and youth services in the early 2010s, has left us with a creaking care system, a postcode lottery of special educational needs support, children’s mental health services unfit for demand or purpose, and an education system straining with the increased demands outside of teaching.
“The promises to ‘build back better’ were broken, and the hope that children would be at the heart of post-Covid government thinking came to little.”
The CFYL’s report sets out that nearly 1.5 million children were persistently absent from school in 2023-24 - a figure that has almost doubled since 2018-19. On top of this, more than 171,000 children were severely absent in 2023-24. This number has almost trebled over the same time period.
The number of suspensions has increased by 118 per cent since 2018-19 to more than 950,000 in 2023-24, and the number of children in alternative provision has increased by 82 per cent to more than 47,000.
It is estimated that up to 400,000 children were not in school in 2023 - an increase of 50 per cent since 2017.
More pupils with SEND
The number of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) has increased by a third since 2017-18 to more than 1.7 million. Of these, nearly three-quarters do not have an education, health and care plan (EHCP), the CFYL says.
The number of children with an EHCP has grown by 90 per cent since 2017-18 to more than 426,000. There has also been an 118 per cent increase in children identified as being autistic since 2017-18.
The CFYL warns that more than 196,000 children did not reach a good level of development at age 5 last year, representing around 32.3 per cent of the cohort.
The report also sets out data on poverty and health, revealing that 4.5 million children were living in relative poverty in the year to April 2024. This was an increase of 900,000 since 2010-11.
As of 2023, one in five children aged 8 to 16 had a common mental health condition - an increase from one in 10 in 2017. There have also been increases in the number of households with children who are homeless, the number of children who are in care and the number of recorded child sexual abuse offences.
‘A missing piece of the jigsaw’
Connie Muttock, the CFYL’s head of policy, said the government’s recent Spending Review showed a “welcome change in direction” by investing more in early help for children.
“But there is still a vitally important missing piece in the jigsaw - an accurate understanding of the scale and nature of child vulnerability in England - and a commitment to reach the children who are too often missed,” she said.
Labour has set a target for 75 per cent of Reception pupils to be achieving a good level of development by 2028.
As part of this focus on early years, the government has increased investment in early years education and childcare, including funding for schools to open new nurseries and incentives for early years teachers to work in disadvantaged communities.
It has also expanded free school meal eligibility to all children living in households in receipt of universal credit. Mental health support teams in schools currently cover 54 per cent of pupils, and the Department for Education intends to increase this proportion to six in 10 by March 2026.
The government is set to announce its plans to reform the SEND support system in a White Paper in the autumn, and also to publish a report from its child poverty task force.
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