You said. We listened.

Who took part

1,652 people completed our survey: 1,617 parents and carers, and 35 young people speaking for themselves. You came from every part of Hampshire, from early years to young adults, and across the whole range of needs: autism, ADHD, speech and language, sensory and physical needs, learning difficulties, social, emotional and mental health, and many children with more than one.

That makes this one of the largest recent pictures of SEND in Hampshire drawn directly from families, not from service records, but from lived experience.

First: what’s going well

It is easy for a survey like this to become a list of everything that is wrong. But you told us about a great deal that is right, and it deserves to be said first and clearly.

Most children are happy at home, and most families rate the quality of their child’s education well. Where children are in the right setting, specialist schools, SEN units and good post-16 provision were praised again and again, families are not just satisfied but grateful. And the early years are a relative bright spot.

The school has been life-changing for my son after years out of education. He is now full-time.

These are not exceptions to be embarrassed about. They are the template, proof that when the right support is in place, it works. The task is to make what these families describe the normal experience, not the lucky one.

The three things that matter most

Three themes run through everything you told us. If Hampshire changed only these, families would feel the difference everywhere.

1. Being heard

Only about half of you feel listened to, involved in decisions about your child, or kept informed, and more than a quarter feel heard on none of these. Families who feel involved are more than twice as likely to say their child’s needs are actually being met.

2. Enough staff who understand

Whether there are enough trained staff around a child is the single biggest thing that decides whether families are happy with their education, and only half feel it is there.

3. Not having to fight

Again and again, you told us support should not take a battle. The fight itself, the emails, meetings and appeals, wears families down before help arrives.

Parents shouldn’t have to resort to complaints to get support put in place.

School and the quality of education

Most families rate their child’s education well, 64% call it good or excellent. But the average hides a wide range, and where a child is taught matters enormously.

Specialist settings are rated highest; mainstream, especially secondary, sits lower. This is not a criticism of mainstream teachers. It reflects what you told us repeatedly: specialist settings are built around SEND, with smaller classes, trained staff and the right environment, while mainstream schools are trying to meet complex needs with less.

The biggest single thing that changes the picture is staffing. Where families feel the staffing around their child is adequate, 88% rate the education good; where they don’t, only 41% do. Yet just half feel it is there. A distinctive worry you raised is that a good education is no use if a child cannot get to it, through anxiety, sensory overload, or a part-time timetable.

The education seems good, but that’s no use if it isn’t being accessed.

What we’re asking for:

• Enough trained staff around every child, especially in mainstream and the secondary years.
• Treat getting a child into the learning, not just the quality of the lesson, as part of a good education.
• Spread what specialist settings do well into mainstream schools.

Being heard, and trusting the system

We combined three questions, do you feel listened to, involved in your child’s targets, and kept informed, into a simple picture of how far families feel part of the system.

Families are split almost down the middle, and the largest single group feels heard on nothing at all. Feeling heard tracks whether the child does well: families who feel involved report their needs being met 69% of the time, against just 32% for those who don’t. What wears trust away most is having to fight; what builds it is simple, a named person who knows your child, honest contact, and being treated as a partner.

They go above and beyond for my child, and support the whole family alongside.

What we’re asking for:

• Give every family a named, consistent point of contact who knows their child.
• Make being listened to, involved and informed the normal experience, and take the fight out of getting support.

Where you live, the postcode picture

Families in different parts of Hampshire told us very different stories. We mapped five things families care about across the county’s districts.

No area is perfect, and none is worst at everything, but the gaps are wide. On rating education good, the best and worst districts are around 27 points apart; on strong friendships, around 26. Two families with similar children can have quite different experiences depending only on which side of a boundary they live. Where you live should not decide the support your child gets.

What we’re asking for:

• Check that special-school places, therapies, specialist staff and activities are within reach everywhere, and close the gaps.
• Report families’ experience by area, over time, so everyone can see whether the gaps are narrowing.

Having a plan, or not

Most children with SEND do not have an EHCP, an Education, Health and Care plan, the legal document that sets out a child’s needs and the support they must get. Children without one are supported through ‘SEND Support’ in school, and they are the majority.

Here is the surprise: children on SEND Support do just as well in the classroom, their education is rated the same, and because almost all are in mainstream they actually have more friends and more social options. But their families are far less likely to be involved in decisions, and far less likely to know what help exists. Being listened to, and being told what is available, should never depend on holding a plan. The families refused a plan are worst off of all.

My child needs one-to-one support from trained staff, but it isn’t available because he has no EHCP.

What we’re asking for:

• Give families on SEND Support the same voice, and the same information, as families with a plan.
• When a plan is refused, offer a clear SEND Support plan.

Health and the NHS

Around one in eight children in the survey also has a health condition, from medical and physical needs to neurological conditions, sensory impairments and genetic disorders. These families deal with the NHS as well as with schools.

The biggest health worry is mental-health support. Of the families who said their child needed CAMHS (child and adolescent mental health services), only about half were receiving it, the rest were on a waiting list or had been told they did not meet the criteria. Families of children with health conditions are often better connected to the system, but their children are more socially isolated, with fewer friendships and social options than other children.

On the waiting list for four years, all we get is an annual letter saying he’s still in the system.

What we’re asking for:

• Cut the wait for mental-health support, and stop turning children away to cope alone.
• Join up health and education so families don’t have to tell their story twice, and build a social life in, not just treatment.

Getting advice: SENDIASS and the Local Offer

Two things are meant to help families find their way: SENDIASS (free, impartial advice on SEND) and the Local Offer (the council’s website listing local support). Where families reached them, they helped, but too many never find them.

SENDIASS is valued: more than two-thirds of families who used it rate it good, and where families feel let down it is usually about how stretched the service is, not the quality of the help. But only about half of families know the Local Offer exists at all, and families without a plan, who most need signposting, are the least likely to have found either.

I’m not aware of any support, my child’s diagnosis is new. I need all the information I can get.

What we’re asking for:

• Hand every family the Local Offer and SENDIASS at the point of diagnosis, don’t wait for them to find it.
• Resource SENDIASS to meet demand, so advice comes without a wait.

Home-to-school transport

For children who can’t simply walk or catch the bus to school, home-to-school transport is a lifeline. Where families have it, most are satisfied, but getting it, and some of the journeys themselves, cause real stress.

About half of families rate the transport good, and most journeys are reasonable, but nearly one in four takes over 45 minutes, and around one in twelve takes more than an hour, which is a long time for a child with SEND. Some families had to appeal simply to be granted transport.

What we’re asking for:

• Make transport simpler to apply for and fairer to be granted, without an appeal.
• Keep journey times as short as reasonably possible, and check the child is supported on the way.

Social care

Social care touches a smaller number of SEND families, but for those it reaches, and those it turns away, it matters enormously. Most families told us it wasn’t needed; among the rest, almost as many were turned away as were supported.

The most important thing you told us is that ‘not meeting the criteria’ is not the same as not needing help. The families told they didn’t meet the threshold report some of the worst outcomes in the whole survey. Where social care is provided, families value it above all for respite, a genuine break. The move to adult social care at 18 was described as a cliff-edge.

Too complex for early help, but not disabled enough for the disabled children’s team, so we were left to cope alone.

What we’re asking for:

• Look at need, not just eligibility, and offer something to families who fall just below the line.
• Protect respite and direct payments, and plan the move to adult social care early.

Types of school

Because where a child is taught matters so much, we looked closely at the different types of school. The pattern is consistent: specialist and special-school provision is rated highest, and a good match between child and setting is what families value most.

Special schools, both council-run and independent, score highly, with independent special schools rated a little higher still, though they serve smaller numbers. In mainstream primary schools, having an EHCP brings families much more of a voice, but not, on its own, a better sense that needs are met. The families who are happiest describe not a type of school but a good fit: the right environment, trained staff, and a move to the right place when the first one wasn’t working.

His education is improving now he can attend full-time, thanks to moving schools.

What we’re asking for:

• Enough specialist places, close enough to home, and quicker moves when a placement clearly isn’t working.

The early years

Families of the youngest children (under 5) are a smaller group in the survey, but a relatively positive one, they report high happiness at home, good early education and, encouragingly, feeling listened to more than average. The early years are where good support can change everything that follows.

The worry families raised is waiting. Long waits for assessment and diagnosis can hold up the support a young child needs at exactly the point it would make the most difference. Getting in early, with help that doesn’t depend on a diagnosis already being in place, is what these families ask for.

What we’re asking for:

• Cut waits for early assessment, and offer support early, before a diagnosis is finalised, not after.

Growing up: preparing for adulthood

Families of older children told us that preparing for adult life, work, independence, friendships and health as an adult, starts too late and stops too suddenly.

Preparation is meant to begin around Year 9 (age 14) and build through school, but families told us it barely rises through secondary, and only climbs later, by which point years of planning should already have happened. Just 18% of plans include the adulthood goals the law expects. At 18, many described a cliff-edge, where children’s services fall away and adult support is hard to find. What young people want is not complicated: a real chance at work or training, help to become more independent, friendships, and not to be dropped at 18.

Everything shuts to us because it’s ‘just for one year’, the transition to adulthood feels hard and unsupported.

What we’re asking for:

• Start preparing for adulthood early, at Year 9, and put real adulthood goals in every plan.
• End the cliff-edge at 18: plan the move to adult services in good time, with families.

The cost to families

Our survey asked about your child. It never asked how you, the parents and carers, were coping. And yet around 50 of you told us anyway, in comment boxes meant for other questions.

Remember that children’s happiness at home is the highest thing in the whole survey? Home is the one place that works, and it works because you make it work, often after giving up a job, going without sleep, and holding everything together with very little help for yourselves. Your wellbeing matters in its own right, and you are entitled to support as a carer, not only your child.

It’s a situation none of us wanted. My own mental health is in the gutter, and it’s affecting all of us.

What we’re asking for:

• Make respite real and easy to get, fund peer support, and offer carers a needs assessment that leads to help.
• Treat the whole family as the unit of care, including brothers and sisters.

Everything we’re asking for

Pulled together, here is what we are taking to Hampshire County Council, the NHS and schools, in your name. Almost none of it is about huge new spending, most is about how families are treated.

• Listen to families, and involve them, for every family, whether or not they have a plan.
• Put enough trained staff around children, especially in mainstream, and in the secondary years.
• Take the fight out of getting support, no more battling, complaining and appealing.
• Make it fair wherever you live, close the gaps between areas.
• Give the SEND Support majority the same voice and information as families with a plan.
• Cut waits for health and mental-health support, and stop turning children away to cope alone.
• Hand every family the Local Offer and SENDIASS early, and resource advice to meet demand.
• Make transport simpler and fairer, with shorter journeys.
• Look at need in social care, not just eligibility, and protect respite.
• Start preparing for adulthood at Year 9, and end the cliff-edge at 18.
• Look after the carers, because when you fall, everything falls.

For young people

If you are a young person with SEND reading this, this part is for you.

Thank you for telling us what your life is like. You told us you want to be listened to, to have friends, to get help to become more independent, and to have a real shot at a job or training you actually care about. You told us it feels unfair when decisions get made about you without you. You’re right, it is.

Your voice counts, and you are allowed to use it. You have the right to be involved in decisions about your own education and support, and to say what a good life looks like for you. If that isn’t happening, you can ask for it, and you can ask someone to help you ask.

Having friends is my number-one priority.

If things feel hard, please don’t carry it on your own. Talk to a parent, carer or a member of staff you trust, or use any of the places below. You matter, and what you want for your life matters.

If you need support now

You don’t have to wait for anything to change to get help today. A few good places to start:

How we did this, and your privacy

Everything here comes from HPCN’s 2026 survey of Hampshire families and young people with SEND, 1,652 responses in all. We’ve written the numbers in plain terms; the detailed figures, and separate reports on each topic, have been shared with the council and the NHS. Where a group of families was very small, we’ve been careful not to read too much into it.

Your privacy has been protected throughout. No one is named or identifiable in this report. We removed names, contact details and anything that could point to an individual, reduced postcodes to a broad area only, and lightly edited quotes for clarity while keeping your words your own. The most sensitive personal stories have been kept private. The quotes here are real, from Hampshire families, just not attributed to anyone.