Impact of UK 2025 budget on SEND families: An overview

Now that the dust is settling on the recent UK Government 2025 Budget, it is time to see what it means for SEND families.

As we can see, it will have a significant, and two-fold, impact on families with children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND):

1. Welfare and cost of living changes (Positive Impact)

The most immediate and widely welcomed change for low-income families was the abolition of the two-child limit on Universal Credit (UC) from April 2026.

• Financial uplift: This means families claiming UC will receive the child element for all their children, not just the first two. This change is expected to be particularly beneficial to households with disabled children, who often face higher living costs and are disproportionately affected by the cap.


• Other benefit changes: The Budget also included an increase in the Universal Credit Standard Allowance and a one-year freeze on prescription charges, which will help alleviate general financial pressures for many families, including those with SEND children.


• Childcare: There are planned reforms and reviews into childcare provision, which could potentially help families with disabled children access more suitable and affordable care, although specific details are yet to be fully confirmed.

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2. Major future funding shift for SEND (Complex/Uncertain Impact)

The Budget announced a significant structural change for SEND funding, which primarily affects local authorities but has indirect implications for families.

• Centralised funding: From the financial year 2028-29, the central government will take over full financial responsibility for all SEND provision costs from local councils. This aims to resolve the massive and rising budget deficits councils have accumulated due to the surging demand for legally-mandated Education, Health, and Care Plans (EHCPs).


• Concerns over current crisis: The change is a future promise and does not immediately address the current crisis families face, such as long waiting times for EHCPs, inadequate provision, and the constant battle for appropriate support. Critics worry that councils, knowing their responsibility is ending, may become even stricter in gatekeeping services until the 2028 shift.


• Funding uncertainty: While the government will absorb the spending risk, the Budget did not set out how the estimated £6 billion annual cost (and accumulated £14 billion historical deficit) will be paid for within the Department for Education’s budget. Experts warn that meeting this cost without new money could lead to cuts in the funding for mainstream schools.


• Need for systemic reform: The government stated the change is intended to enable systemic reform of the SEND system, with a white paper expected in early 2026. However, parents and charities caution that a change in who pays is meaningless without fundamental reforms to ensure legal compliance, accountability, capacity building (e.g., in specialist schools), and proper staff training.

In summary, the recent Budget offered immediate, positive financial relief for low-income families through welfare changes (like scrapping the two-child limit), but introduced a complex, long-term change to SEND funding that brings hope for future systemic stability but offers no present solution to the immediate, ongoing crisis for children needing support.

We will watch and see what happens as these Budget changes roll out; it is likely that we will be returning to this topic in the coming months and perhaps even years… I’ll keep you posted!