Strategic SEND Partnership Board minutes summary - 17 September 2025

Attendance

• Emma Cockerell (chair) Director, Children's Services, Wokingham Borough Council (WBC)
• Andrea King (guest) Strategic Lead for Berkshire Neurodiverse Transformation
• Carey Tulloch Head of Strategic Commissioning and Transformation, WBC
• Charlotte Seymour Strategic Project Support Officer, WBC
• David Maycock Co-Headteacher, Addington School
• Jamie Conran Head of Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND), WBC
• Julie Pudephatt Interim Head of Transitions and Complex Care, WBC
• Kelli Scott Head of Service, Children with Disabilities, Early Help and Prevention Youth Justice Service
• Laura Mackenzie (guest) Transformation and Project Lead (SEND and Education), WBC
• Louise Noble Service Director, NHS Children, Families and All-age Services (Children & Young Peoples Mental Health Services, All-age Eating Disorders Services and Services for People with a Learning Disability)
• Mark McCurrie SEND Advisor, Department for Education
• Ming Zhang Service Director, Education and SEND, WBC
• Sudeshna Banerjee Data and Insight Team Manager - Reporting, Education & SEND, WBC
• Terri Walsh Joint CEO, SEND Voices Wokingham (parent carer forum) 

Apologies

• Hayley Rees Service Director, Strategy, Transformation and Commissioning, WBC
• Lajla Johansson Head of All-age Learning Disability and Neuro-Divergence and SEND 0-25, NHS Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Integrated Care Board
• Lisa Evans Service Director Adult Social Care (Operations), WBC    
• Miranda Walcott Designated Clinical Officer for SEND, NHS Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Integrated Care Board
• Peter Griffiths Headteacher, St Crispin’s School    
• Councillor Prue Bray Deputy Leader and Executive Councillor for Children's Services, WBC
• Sarah Clarke Joint CEO, SEND Voices Wokingham (parent carer forum)

Actions from July’s meeting

• Making minutes easier to read: We’re looking at how to share the minutes from these board meetings so families can access them easily.
• Post-16 options video: A video is being created with young people. It is planned to be ready for the November Partnership Board meeting.
• Wheelchair service: Families and schools have been told about the new NHS wheelchair provider. Some issues remain, and Miranda Walcott is being made aware.
• Health waiting times: Ming Zhang has arranged a meeting for 30 September to discuss with senior health leaders. 

SEND transformation

Ming Zhang explained we are focusing on inclusion and belonging in schools. This will include measuring things like:

• Are children’s needs being met?
• How do outcomes compare to other pupils?
• Attendance and exclusion numbers

Young people have told us that feeling they belong is really important. 

A new Education Belonging Strategy is being developed with the Wokingham Education Partnership.

Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs)

Jamie Conran shared that we are working on:

• Making EHCPs timely and high quality
• Learning from audits
• Reviewing older plans

We know annual review quality and timeliness is a priority and will keep working on this.

Exclusions and absence

Exclusions went up in June and July, including 3 permanent exclusions in primary schools. 

Actions

We will review if the schools that have permanently excluded are supported by NHS Mental Health Support Teams. We will look at how the current needs of primary schools are being met.

Partnership for Neurodiversity in Schools (PINS) 

Laura Mackenzie shared the offer for 30 primary schools. Find out more about PINS.

Action

We will look at how the PINS work can support primary schools with exclusions and suspensions. 

NHS therapies review

We agreed that more detail is needed in this report.

Action

More detail will be added and this will be discussed at the next Partnership Board meeting in November.

Neurodiverse transformation

Andrea King shared that there has been progress with this work across Berkshire West. Next step is a workshop on 12 November. This will look at different tools that can be used to identify needs and which tool is right for Wokingham. 

Find out more about this work. 

Performance data

We looked at data from local health services and Wokingham Borough Council. 

We discussed tribunal trends. We are developing a way to capture data on tribunals and mediations. The SEND Assurance Board will look at this data and present it to the Partnership Board. 

An error was noted with the Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) data reporting.

Action

Louise Noble will follow this up with Miranda Walcott.

Any other business

The results of the SEND Voices Wokingham annual survey will be reviewed by the Partnership Board at the meeting in November.

The SEND Assurance Board are working together on a response to the survey.