Transforming support for children in the welfare and education system
England’s systems to support children with additional needs are out of control, while failing those they were designed to protect.
The number of pupils with Education, Health and Care Plans has more than doubled since 2015/16, rising from 240,000 to over 480,000 in 2024/25. Across all children and young people, there were 640,000 EHCPs in January 2025, up 80 per cent since 2019.
This growth has been highly concentrated. Eighty-eight per cent of the rise in school-pupil EHCPs has come from three areas of need: Autistic Spectrum Disorder, Speech, Language and Communication Needs, and Social, Emotional and Mental Health. These now account for over 70 per cent of EHCPs.
The child disability benefit system has expanded on a similar trajectory. Child Disability Living Allowance (CDLA) claims doubled from 420,000 children in 2016 to almost 900,000 by 2025, driven largely by behavioural disorders and ADHD. It is set to exceed one million in 2026.
The central problem identified in this report is that systems designed to provide specialist support for children with the most severe and enduring needs are increasingly being used to manage a much broader range of behavioural, developmental and educational difficulties.
Children facing all types of difficulties deserve care and support. But in the course of this research, we have heard resoundingly from medical professionals that far too many children are being escalated into improper medical pathways via expanded diagnostic criteria, as well as through irresistible incentives to statutory entitlements and benefits, when earlier practical interventions – including from parents – would be both more supportive for children and more sustainable for the taxpayer.
However, rising demand reflects both rising levels of childhood vulnerability and systemic dysfunction. More children are arriving at school with additional needs, but the system then intensifies demand by making diagnosis and legal entitlement the main routes to support. The result is a model that stretches budgets, increases waiting lists, fuels conflict between parents and councils, and weakens support for children with the most complex needs.
In this report we call for a new approach: one that intervenes earlier, defines need more clearly, reduces incentives to escalate, and restores sustainability so that children with the highest needs remain the priority within the system.
