Some pupils with autism have to ‘fail’ before support given, MSPs told

Some pupils with autism in Scotland are forced to “fail” in mainstream education before receiving the necessary support, MSPs have heard.

Appearing before the Education, Children and Young People Committee at Holyrood on Wednesday, Suzi Martin, the external affairs manager for the National Autistic Society Scotland said the pace of progress on support for children needing more support has been too slow.

The Scottish Government released its additional support for learning action plan in October 2020 following a review.

Ms Martin welcomed the action plan, but said progress had been “slow and it’s not created the change that we needed to see”.

“That’s very obvious still to this day because we hear from families still to this day that do not feel like their autistic child or young person is supported or included in the mainstream school environment,” she said.

“And we see continually autistic children and young people are forced to ‘fail’ at mainstream before any other option or support is offered.

“And even still then families are forced to fight the system to get that support and many are forced into legal action and engaging a solicitor before a solution is found.

“Clearly something is not working and the system is not working for autistic children and young people when it comes to receiving their rights to an education.”

She continued: “We don’t actually necessarily know the scale of this problem because, for example, recording around part-time timetables is not consistent and not accurate, so I think this is something that we don’t understand the scale of.

“But we know from families we hear from every day that it is a huge problem for autistic children and young people in engaging in education and not feeling included in school.”

Ms Martin said three things would need to change to improve the situation, including improving the environment of schools, as well as ensuring more resources are given for specialist staff in mainstream schools.

She also stressed the importance of “ensuring that staff have the correct level of autism understanding … how can you have a positive relationship with an autistic child or young person if you don’t understand what autism is?”.

A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “While it is for local councils to determine the most appropriate educational provision, the Scottish Government is committed to improving the experiences and outcomes for young people with additional support needs, and spending on additional support for learning reached a record high of £830 million in the most recently published figures.

“We have continued to invest £15 million per year since 2019-20 to help schools respond to the individual needs of children and young people.

“We also provide over £11 million in funding to directly support pupils with complex additional support needs and services to children and families.

“The Scottish Government and Cosla have publicly reported on the progress of delivering the actions of the ASL Action Plan. 

“This demonstrates ongoing and sustained delivery of the actions since the action plan was established. 

“A further update on progress will be published in May 2024.”