Q24. We propose creating a more direct route to Specialist Provision Packages and EHCP assessments for children under 5 with complex needs. How can we make sure this works in practice?

The context: The Department for Education and the Department for Health and Social Care will work with NHS England to enable better information sharing to speed up the process of matching children to a Specialist Provision Package, effectively creating a fast track route for children under 5.

In your answer, you may want to consider:

• Many care-experienced children will not attend early years settings consistently, nor have consistent contact with education and health professionals during their early years due to unstable family situations, changes of placement and moves to adoptive or kinship families. They risk missing out on the possibility of fast track identification of their needs.
• The fast track option should be extended to all care-experienced children of any age in respect of the likely delays to assessment and diagnosis that they will have experienced during their early lives.