What is the Local Offer?

Since September 2014 every local authority has been required to publish information about services that they expect to be available in their area for children and young people from birth to 25 who have Special Educational Needs or Disabilities (SEND) and this is known as the “Local Offer”.

In Gloucestershire, the Local Offer has been renamed to “Support for Families with SEND, Gloucestershire’s Local Offer”.  This was done in response to concerns raised by families through Gloucestershire Parent Carer Forum that the term “local offer” didn’t really explain what it was and what it was designed to do.

Our Local Offer provides information, advice and guidance to help families understand how we work across the local area of Gloucestershire to support children and young people with SEND and their parent carers.

The directory part of the local offer lists the services available from the local authority, NHS, early years, schools and colleges as well as from external organisations such as charities or businesses.

Who is the Local Offer for?

The Local Offer is primarily designed for use by parents, children and young people with SEND. However, it also enables practitioners and professionals to see clearly what services are available in their local area and how and when they can be accessed.

The Local Offer should be:

• Collaborative – Local authorities must involve parents, children and young people in developing and reviewing the Local Offer. They must also cooperate with those providing services.
• Accessible – The published Local Offer should be easy to understand, factual and jargon free. It should be structured in a way that relates to young people’s and parents’ needs, for example by broad age group or type of special educational provision. It should be well signposted and well publicised.
• Comprehensive – Parents and young people should know what support is expected to be available across education, health and social care from age 0 to 25 and how to access it. The Local Offer must include eligibility criteria for services where relevant and make it clear where to go for information, advice and support, as well as how to make complaints about provision or appeal against decisions.
• Up to date – When parents and young people access the Local Offer it is important that the information is up to date.
• Transparent – The Local Offer should be clear about how decisions are made and who is accountable and responsible for them.

Tell us what you think

Your feedback on ‘Support for Families with SEND Gloucestershire’s Local Offer’ and (Future Me, our local offer for children and young people) helps us to ensure it is meeting the needs of families across Gloucestershire.

We welcome all feedback about what you find helpful and unhelpful or suggestions you have to make improvements. Please email your feedback to: localoffer@gloucestershire.gov.uk.

On every page of the service directory you will find a tab, ‘is this information correct?’  This tab opens a form where you can let us know if you cannot find a service or the information you are looking for, or if the information is out of date. 

We use this to make contact with services to ensure their information of the service directory is correct.

Every year we publish a report to set out what we have been told by you and what we have done as a result.

 *REVIEWED SEPTEMBER 2023*