Following a high number of contacts from constituents regarding potholes Sojan Joseph MP wrote to the Department for Transport on 15th October, the question stated:

A new multi-million-pound investment is set to transform support for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) across the county.

Today (April 15), the government has awarded Kent County Council (KCC) with £12,155,170 to provide a brand new service.

Sojan Joseph, MP for Ashford, Hawkinge, and the Villages has today (15/04/2026) welcomed significant investment from the Labour government into local SEND provision. Kent County Council is to be allocated £12,155,170 to set up a new ‘Experts at Hand’ offer.
As announced in February’s Schools White Paper, the service is designed to provide children with early support and fast access to professionals like speech and language therapists, occupational therapists, and educational psychologists. The offer will involve partnerships between special schools, alternative provision, and mainstream settings to put support in place without needing to go through lengthy assessment processes.

Families in Kent have expressed concerns about long waits in the SEND system, which has led to issues escalating to crisis point before intervention. Labour’s reforms set out in the Schools White Paper, including the introduction of Experts at Hand, are designed to move support earlier in the process, closer to home, without parents having to fight for it.
The final guidance for Experts at Hand will be published next month, setting out how Kent County Council should use the funding to start standing up the service and the grant conditions associated with it.