DEVON County Council is reviewing how it spends money on special educational needs in a bid to make the service more effective.

It comes as the county witnesses rising numbers of children with special needs and or disabilities and faces additional government scrutiny following its £95 million education-related bailout.

The council spends money on independent special school placements for children who can’t be accommodated by mainstream schools, and on alternative education provision, which provides short-term support, for those who have been excluded from school, are in care, or missing from education.

At present, the council uses a so-called ‘spot purchase’ method, where it pays for each child on a case-by-case basis.

Teams must research which provider will best suit that child, and agree a whole raft of terms, a time-consuming process that the council wants to streamline.

Cllr Lois Samuel, cabinet member for children’s Send improvement, told Devon County Council’s cabinet the authority would establish a better way of commissioning, coupled with ‘better performance monitoring and improved outcomes’.

She said: ‘Spot purchasing is done by different teams across the education service, but this change will mean we have a co-ordinated process with an approved list of providers.

‘This will include current providers and any possible new entrants, and this approach to commissioning will mirror how other parts of our council do it and also benchmark us with other authorities.’

Council officers said the spot purchase method made sense when fewer children had to be catered for, but not with bigger numbers.

A new report to the council also showed five per cent of pupils attending Devon state-funded schools had education, health and care plans (EHCPs), equivalent to 5,099 pupils.

‘This is significantly higher than nationally and regionally,’ the report said.

That could include home-schooled children, or children educated in independent settings.

Cutting costs will be vital for the council, which is being tasked with demonstrating improvements to its Send service by the Department for Education (DfE).

While the government gave the council £95 million last year as part of a so-called Safety Valve scheme, the money is actually arriving in tranches over eight or nine years, with caveats attached.

Donna Manson, council chief executive, said the additional focus on the department was positive.

‘This is one of the benefits of the Safety Valve scheme in terms of the level of scrutiny and the gateways we have to go through,’ she said.

‘We need the capability to manage the volume of changes post-covid, managing the changing demand and the return to school, which has been difficult for some.

‘We know there is an increased volume and requirement for Send, and independent placements did increase, and now we have a much greater capability to manage it.’

The council will now review the contractual arrangements with its independent providers and discuss block contracting to reduce the overall price, as part of various measures to improve the service.

It estimates it could save between £200,000 to £600,000 through block contracts in the short term.