A single special needs pupil in Kent is costing the taxpayer more than £160,000 a year, according to a new report.
The startling revelation appears in papers which went before the scrutiny committee at Kent County Council (KCC) on Wednesday (July 16).
The panel investigated special educational needs and disability (SEND) for post-16s.
The new Reform UK KCC leadership is exploring avenues to cut waste or inefficiencies, especially in home-to-school transport (HST), which currently costs £97m a year.
Under a section titled “SEND policy position”, the document cites “real tribunal cases”.
The first case stated said: “A high achieving post 16 young person, formerly a pupil at a selective school, whose parents secured an educational package costing £160,192.70 per annum.”
It is understood the package includes personalised tuition at £78 per hour, sporting activities, mentors, practical and social activities, as well as occupational therapy support to allow the young person to access GCSEs and higher-level qualifications.
The scheme also covers mileage and was provided to the family through a personal budget.
The papers also cited: “Parents securing a place at an expensive private independent special school which requires long-distance home-to-school transport when there is a place available at a high-quality state funded special school nearer to home.”
It also claims to demonstrate a parental preference to have their children, who have education, health and care plans (EHCPs), to be placed at “expensive private independent special schools”, rather than a mainstream placement which can meet the child’s needs.
Former grammar school head teacher Peter Read, an acknowledged education expert and founder of Kent Education Matters, confessed he was “amazed” at the cost of the child’s package.
While not commenting on the case study highlighted in the papers, he said that some parents who are denied special needs provision often win on appeal because the council rarely fights and wins cases at tribunal.
Mr Read added: “Clearly, there is a reason for parents to go to tribunal, especially if they are middle-class and educated rather than those at the lower end of the social spectrum who might not have the skills or the finances to follow it through.
“Tribunals tend to be very supportive of parents who take their children to appeal – and the statistics support this.”
Now the cabinet member for education at KCC, Cllr Beverley Fordham, who represents Dartford West, will raise her concerns and case studies “directly” with the government.
The report states: “It is important to develop a more sustainable school system which provides opportunities for children and young people to attend a school close to their home.
“We will strongly lobby the government to bring forward the two new special schools, in Swanley and Whitstable, which were due to open in September 2026 and there is still no date for starting the building programmes.
“By doing this we will benefit families in accessing a place in a state-funded special school as well as helping to reduce pressures on the home-to-school transport budget.”
The report says there is a “constant stream of expensive, independent special schools being agreed by the Department for Education that then go on to aggressively market their offer to parents and create a demand.”
The report says that Kent “spends over half of its funding on special schools and is ranked within the top 20 local authorities in the country for the number of special school places per head of the population”.
The county has 25 publicly-funded Kent special schools which provide 6,500 places at a cost of over £160m per year and a further 1,800 children are placed in the independent private sector at an additional cost of over £80m annually, according to the papers.
It says national data shows Kent has the “equivalent of 40%” more children placed in special provision than across the country, contributing to an overspend on the high needs block (HNB).
