Lancashire SEND Partnership Board Terms of Reference 2025
The Lancashire Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities (SEND) Partnership Board brings together partners who work together to deliver our shared vision, values, and priorities. The Lancashire SEND Partnership that forms the Board is an equal partnership of Lancashire County Council, education providers, the Lancashire, and South Cumbria Integrated Care Board (ICB), and healthcare providers, Lancashire Parent Carer Forum, and POWAR the children and young people’s participation group. The Board oversees and monitors the SEND Plan 2021-2025 and its impact and effectiveness at improving educational outcomes.
1. Purpose of the Lancashire SEND Partnership Board
The SEND Partnership Board purpose is to:
- Promote a culture of inclusion and partnership working through co-production.
- Act as the strategic governance body for SEND with oversight of the SEND improvements across Lancashire.
- Ensure the shared vision and clear strategy for the improvement of SEND services in Lancashire is implemented.
- Ensure that improvements are effective and have a positive impact on outcomes for children and young people with SEND, and their families.
- Ensure that improvements deliver appropriate consistency in delivery of services, removing unwarranted variation, and ensure there is equality of access to provision.
- Ensure there are robust strategies, structures, and systems to hear the voice of parent carers and voice of children and young people at a strategic, operational and individual level to deliver effective coproduction, embed the desired accountabilities, and improve communication to restore and maintain the public confidence of these primary stakeholders.
- Ensure effective individual co-production and meaningful engagement with children, young people and their families is embedded in the culture of all SEND and associated services.
- Ensure co-production takes place with all stakeholders and partners, and specifically LPCF as the voice of parent carers and POWAR (As outlined within the Protocol agreed by the SEND Partnership Board in January 2024 and similar undertakings provided to the POWAR Group).
- Provide oversight, check, and challenge with progress on improvement plans for SEND, ensuring that there is full scrutiny of the work that is being delivered.
- Ensure the lived experience of children and young people with SEND is improved, and that their needs are met through the effective delivery of Education, Health, and Care Plans (EHCPs) and through the SEND support they receive.
2. Role of the Board
The role of the Partnership Board is to:
- Ensure the SEND Plan 2021-2025 is implemented in an effective, transparent, and timely manner.
- Oversee the delivery of the wider work programme for SEND and take on the role of ‘check and challenge’ for scrutiny of the actions.
- Ensure meaningful engagement with children, young people and their families is embedded in the culture of all SEND and associated services.
- Ensure engagement and co-production takes place with all stakeholders and partners.
- Engage with relevant departmental and statutory bodies, such as the Department for Education, Department of Health and Social Care, and the National Health Service.
3. Decision Making and Delegation
The LCC Executive Director for Education and Children's Services along with the Chief Nursing Officer representing the Integrated Care Board are jointly accountable for the SEND Plan 2021-2025.
LCC Director of Education, Culture and Skills is responsible for reporting on progress to the SEND Partnership Board and the County Council’s Cabinet.
The Senior Responsible Officer for Health is responsible for reporting on progress to the SEND Partnership Board and through the Quality Committee to ICB Board.
4. Governance
The SEND Partnership Board governance structure is as illustrated in Appendix A.
5. Membership
Board members act as representatives for their sector or organisation as part of the partnership, sharing the perspective of their sector, whilst also engaging with their sector and keeping others informed of information that comes through the SEND Partnership Board.
The SEND Partnership Board membership Appendix B.
6. Tenure of Membership
The chairing of the SEND Partnership Board will be reviewed every year in line with membership of the Board. The membership of the Board will be reviewed every year to ensure that it continues to reflect the SEND partnership, and to ensure that there are no vacancies.
7. Quoracy
The meeting is quorate with either the Chair or Vice Chair in attendance along with 50% of the membership. Where a meeting is inquorate it can proceed with decisions to be ratified at the next meeting.
8. Attendance by Non-members
Invitations may be extended to non-members where their input or advice supports the discussion taking place at the meeting.
9. Substitution at Meetings
The Chair and Vice Chair of the Partnership Board are expected to attend 90% of meetings, with one or other in attendance at each meeting. Members are expected to attend 80% or more of the Board meetings. If more than three meetings are missed, this may result in membership being terminated. Substitutions for attendance will be by exception only.
10. Frequency of Meetings
The Board will meet half termly, with meetings taking place in September, November, January, March, May, and July each academic year. An extra-ordinary meeting will be scheduled annually for the young people's Take Over of the SEND Partnership Board, co-produced by young people. There will also be an annual SEND Partnership Development Day to focus on future planning.
11. Communication and Sharing Information
The minutes of each Board meeting will be uploaded to the SEND Partnership website and will be publicly available within five working days of being approved by the Board as an accurate record.
Additionally, within one week of each Board meeting members will receive a Board Brief with key messages that they should share with those people or groups that a Board member represents from across the Partnership.
POWAR have requested that a summary template is implemented for agenda items.
12. Declaration of Interest and Confidentiality
Board members must declare a direct personal or professional interest related to any items under discussion.
At times the Board will consider sensitive and/or confidential items which will be identified within papers and at the meeting. Such items remain confidential until such time it is agreed otherwise.
13. Review
The Board will keep the purpose of its work, priorities for action and governance structure under regular review.
Appendix C identifies the point in the Board calendar when various aspects will be reviewed.
Appendices:
Appendix A SEND Partnership Board Governance Structure
Appendix B SEND Partnership Board Membership List
Appendix C SEND Partnership Board Standing Agenda Items
Appendix A SEND Partnership Board Governance Structure
- Lancashire and South Cumbria ICB Board
- Lancashire County Council Cabinet
- SEND Partnership Board (Chair Sarah O'Brien ICB, Vice Chair Jacqui Old LCC) - Key partners with oversight and responsibility for ensuring statutory obligations are met and the SEND Strategic Plan is delivered
- Children's Safeguarding Assurance Partnership
- Adults Safeguarding Board
- Children, Young People and Families Partnership
- Health and Wellbeing Board
- Joint Commissioning Network Forum
- ICB SEND Assurance Group
- SEND Partnership Agenda Setting Group – Chair Paul Turner LCC, Vice Chair Vanessa Wilson ICB) - Priority leads, making sure actions are delivered on through co-production
- Priority delivery groups – working groups/task and finish groups
- ICB groups – Mental Health Delivery Group/Autism Oversight Group/SEND Champions Network
- SEND Partnership Board (Chair Sarah O'Brien ICB, Vice Chair Jacqui Old LCC) - Key partners with oversight and responsibility for ensuring statutory obligations are met and the SEND Strategic Plan is delivered
The Golden Thread – Co-production
- Parent carer voice
- Young person's voice
- Strategic partners – Lancashire Parent Carer Forum, POWAR
- Integral – valued and equal partners at al layers within partnership
- Quality assured – Genuine Partnership Model, Lundy Model embedded
- Accountability assured – feedback provided, workforce development and digitisation
Appendix B SEND Partnership Board Membership List
Senior Leads
Sarah O'Brien, Chair Chief Nursing Officer, Lancashire and South Cumbria Integrated Care Board
Email: sarah.obrien19@nhs.net
Jacqui Old, Vice Chair Executive Director of Education and Children's Services, Lancashire County Council
Email: jacqui.old@lancashire.gov.uk
Paul Turner, Director of Education, Culture and Skills, Education and Children's Services
Email: paul.turner@lancashire.gov.uk
Vanessa Wilson, Director Children, Young People and Maternity
Email: vanessa.wilson6@nhs.net
County Councillors
Councillor Jayne Rear, County Councillor, Legal, Governance and Registrars. Cabinet Member for Education and Skills.
Email: jayne.rear@lancashire.gov.uk
Councillor Cosima Towneley, County Councillor, Legal, Governance and Registrars. Cabinet Member for Children and Families.
Email: cosima.towneley@lancashire.gov.uk
Councillor Michael Green, County Councillor, Legal, Governance and Registrars. Cabinet Member for Health and Wellbeing
Email: michael.green@lancashire.gov.uk
Lancashire County Council
Dave Carr, Director of Policy Commissioning and Children's Health
Email: dave.carr@lancashire.gov.uk
Ruksana Sardar-Akram, Consultant in Public Health (Interim)
Email: ruksana.sardar-akram@lancashire.gov.uk
Louise Anderson, Director of Children's Social Care
Email: louise.anderson2@lancashire.gov.uk
Charlotte Hammond, Head of Service for Learning Disability and Autism
Email: charlotte.hammond@lancashire.gov.uk
Kathy Ashworth, Head of Early Help
Email: kathy.ashworth@lancashire.gov.uk
Cerys Townsend, Head of SEND and Inclusion
Email: cerys.townsend@lancashire.gov.uk
Neil Willcocks, Service Manager, Learning Disabilities, Autism and Mental Health
Email: neil.willcocks@lancashire.gov.uk
Schools and Colleges
Philippa Perks, PVI Early Years representative
Email: philippa@u4cpreschoolcentre.co.uk
Natalie Sinclair, Early Years representative
Email: natalie@highfield-nur.lancs.sch.uk
Jane Curl, Primary Schools representative
Email: head@sthildas-carleton.lancs.sch.uk
Oliver Handley, Secondary Schools representative
Email: o.handley@pendlevale.lancs.sch.uk
Ian Carden, Special Schools representative
Email: head@ridgewood.lancs.sch.uk
Marie Haworth, Further Education representative
Email: mhaworth@preston.ac.uk
Vacant, Higher Education representative Lancaster University
Lancashire Parent Carer Forum Representatives
Sam Jones, Chair
Email: chair@lancashireparentcarerforum.org.uk
Gillian Rankin, South Lead for Lancashire Parent Carer Forum Representative
Email admin@parentcarerforum.org.uk
Clive Groves, Associate Development Support for Lancashire Parent Carer Forum
Email: associatelpcf@lancashireparentcarerforum.org.uk
Children and Young People Representatives
POWAR Young Person representative with a member of staff from the Participation Team
Email: via suliman.hussain@lancashire.gov.uk / clare.smith@lancashire.gov.uk
SEND Partnership
Jenny Ashton, Manager of the SEND Partnership
Email: jennifer.ashton@lancashire.gov.uk
Appendix C SEND Partnership Board Standing Agenda Items
At each meeting
- Minutes of the previous meeting
- Risk Register
- Action Tracker
- Forward Plan
- Highlight Reports of improvement activity against key performance indicators and targets, including related data dashboards.
- Comment from POWAR representatives.
- Key topics related to the SEND plan and the SEND Code of Practice
- Review of Improvement Plan
Every 6 months
- Half yearly improvement plan progress report
Every 12 months
- Annual SEND Partnership report comprising:
- Annual report from the SENDIAS team
- Annual report from the Designated Clinical Officers
- Annual report from the Parent Carer Forum
- Annual report and SEND Partnership takeover from POWAR
- Annual report from Participation Lead
- Annual report from the Designated Social Care Officer
- Annual report from the Family Hubs regarding SEND
- Annual review of Local Offer improvements
- Annual review of EHCP and Annual Review Audits
- Review of the SEND Partnership Board Chair role
- Review of the SEND Partnership Board membership
- Review of the Board Terms of Reference and Governance Structure