What was announced
The changes came in the Schools White Paper published on 23 February 2026, a policy document that sets out plans for legislation. The headline: by 2035, only children with the most complex needs would qualify for an education, health and care plan. The proportion of pupils with EHCPs has nearly doubled in a decade, from 2.8% to 5.3%, and the government argues the system cannot meet demand on its current path. The National Audit Office had previously called the system broken, and the Office for Budget Responsibility forecasts the gap between SEND funding and council spending reaching £6bn by 2028-29.
The new structure
Every child with SEND would have an individual support plan (ISP), drawn up by their nursery, school or college in consultation with parents and reviewed at least once a year. All children would have a legal right to one. The ISP describes needs and day-to-day support; it does not replace the EHCP's role as the legal entitlement framework, and children with EHCPs would hold both documents.
What the ISP records then determines a layer of support:
- Targeted: help in small groups and reasonable adjustments in class.
- Targeted plus: more intensive involvement from outside specialists.
- Specialist: the highest layer, and under the proposals the only one whose children would be eligible for an EHCP.
Alongside the structure, the government announced £4bn over three years to make mainstream schools more inclusive, including £1.6bn directly to schools, early years settings and colleges, and £1.8bn for access to specialist teachers and speech and language therapists.
The timeline
- Now: nothing changes. The current law, deadlines and tribunal rights all stand.
- September 2029: reassessments begin for existing EHCP holders, at the end of their current phase of education. A child in Year 2 today would be reassessed in Year 6.
- 2035: the government's target date for EHCP eligibility narrowing to the most complex needs, with the proportion of pupils holding plans back around today's level.
What it means if you are in the system today
Existing plans are kept until the end of the current education phase. New applications work exactly as before: the council must decide whether to assess within 6 weeks and issue any final plan within 20 weeks. Those duties are unchanged and councils' performance against them still varies enormously. Check your council's report card for its current record. If anything, knowing the local baseline matters more while the system is in flux.
One process change worth noting for the future: complaints about what an ISP says would go through the school's complaints system first, before the local authority or government, whereas EHCP disputes keep the mediation and tribunal route.
About this page
This page summarises the published proposals in factual terms; it is not legal advice, and the proposals can change as legislation goes through Parliament. We update it as the reforms firm up. Statistics are from the Department for Education and the announcements of 23 February 2026.