Local authorities across England are warning that the soaring cost of transporting children with special educational needs and disabilities to school has become unsustainable, with a stark new proposal to introduce means-testing for families now provoking a fierce backlash from campaigners.
Analysis by the County Councils Network (CCN) projects that annual expenditure on SEND home-to-school transport could rocket to £3.4bn by 2030-31, up from £2bn last year. Without what it calls “radical” reform, councils say they will be transporting 100,000 additional pupils within six years – “a city’s worth of young people”.
The financial pressure is already acute. The National Audit Office has highlighted that councils in England overspent their budgets for this service by £415 million in the 2023-24 financial year alone, with total costs having more than doubled since 2015-16 to a record £2.26 billion. The average cost of transporting a pupil with SEND is now around £8,900 per year, almost triple that for mainstream transport, rising to £9,800 in county areas.
In a bid to restore financial sustainability, the CCN is urging the government to introduce a national means-testing policy as part of its imminent SEND reforms. This would require families above a specified income threshold to contribute financially to their child’s transport. The network advises this would need to be “implemented sensitively and progressively”, acknowledging the current cost of living crisis.
A proposal met with alarm
The means-testing proposal has been met with immediate alarm by charities and advocacy groups. Anna Bird, chair of the Disabled Children’s Partnership and chief executive of Contact, warned that it risked locking disabled children out of education. “School transport should be based on a child’s need and not what their parents earn,” she said. “Transporting disabled children to school is far more complicated than for their non-disabled peers. Means testing transport doesn’t just balance budgets – it risks locking disabled children and young people out of education altogether.”
This view was echoed by Tania Tirraoro of Special Needs Jungle, who said the call to curtail rights for financial reasons was “standard fare” for local authorities, and by Madeleine Cassidy, chief executive of the legal charity IPSEA. Cassidy argued that long journeys and rising costs were “not the result of excessive ‘demand’ from parents, but of years of under‑investment and unlawful decision‑making that force children into settings far from home.”
Councils are legally required to provide free transport for school-age children who cannot walk to their nearest suitable school due to distance, special educational needs, disabilities, or safety concerns. Eligibility is assessed individually and is not contingent on having an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP).
Systemic pressures driving the crisis
The CCN’s report, “Home to School Transport: How SEND reform can make services sustainable”, identifies a confluence of factors behind the financial crisis. A key driver is the number of children with EHCPs, which has more than doubled since 2015. This is coupled with a chronic lack of suitable local school places, forcing councils to place children in settings further from home.
This has led to a heavy reliance on taxis and private hire vehicles, often for single-occupancy journeys, at a time of rising fuel and wage inflation and a shrinking market of transport providers. The issues are particularly pronounced in rural county areas where distances are greater. Bill Revans, the CCN’s SEND spokesperson, said the numbers were “becoming overwhelming for many councils’ budgets”.
Alongside means-testing, the CCN proposes a review of the statutory walking distances that trigger eligibility, annual reviews of transport arrangements to encourage greater independence over time, and clear messaging that individual taxi transport is “an option of last resort”.
The debate comes ahead of a delayed government Schools White Paper on SEND reform, now expected in early 2026. Earlier this month, ministers announced a £5bn package to clear 90% of local authority SEND deficits, but this explicitly does not cover home-to-school transport expenditure. A Department for Education spokesperson said its reforms would “transform life chances” and build a more inclusive system, “restores financial sustainability, and ends the postcode lottery once and for all.”
The National Audit Office has previously described the wider SEND system in England as “broken” and unsustainable, a context in which the battle over transport costs is now intensifying.
