Labour’s Send revolution is a high-stakes experiment. It also threatens precious parental rights | John Harris

Labour’s Send revolution is a high-stakes experiment. It also threatens precious parental rights John Harris Bridget Phillipson’s 10-year plan is generous in places, but it has its problems. Not least that it could be trashed by a Reform government W hether the change is down to the shifting of the Overton window or the demise of basic decency, one awful feature of the current national conversation is becoming clearer by the day: the demonisation of disabled and vulnerable children and young people – and their parents – by voices that seemingly know no shame at all. The crude version of the “ overdiagnosis ” theory – essentially, the idea that such conditions as autism and ADHD are exaggerated and confected – is everywhere. Seemingly by law, every two-bit newspaper columnist must now write an annual piece about how the cutting edge of human psychology and child development is really just a byword for needless expense and sharp-elbowed families milking the state. A Facebook page used to find people to speak to the media recently appealed for a “mum who’s concerned her child’s school budget is being spent on pupils with special educational needs”. Aren’t there, the ad wondered, “more important things you feel the school should be spending money on? For example … computers, sports equipment etc?” The fee offered to anyone willing to stoop that low was £150. By and large, Keir Starmer’s government stands well away from that kind of nastiness. Indeed, as Bridget Phillipson spent Sunday and Monday unveiling the Department for Education’s sweeping changes to England’s system for children with special educational needs and disabilities – or Send – her messaging emphasised the complete opposite. Here, it seemed, was an optimistic, inclusive vision of increased spending on Send provision, a kinder education system, and a welcome sense that the often nuanced and intricate educational requirements of our 21st-century children – 1.7 million of whom are currently classified as ha...