Budget for SEND school almost doubles in Blackburn with Darwen

A schools project that is set to improve the provision of places for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) has seen its costs almost double to £1.9m.

On Thursday night, Blackburn with Darwen Council’s executive board was asked to approve a ‘significant’ £900,000 uplift to the original £1m budget for a new SEND school in the borough, after the site was devastated by vandalism and theft.

The ruling body was informed that this spike in costs for the Stansfeld Centre renovation project was partly due to people breaking into the site to cause damage, as well as thieves who had gone in and stripped the building’s copper pipes.

In addition to the costs incurred by vandals, education chief Cllr Gunn told the executive that another factor in the £900,000 uplift was a redesign of the project, which had initially been intended for primary school children with complex needs, but would now be used by secondary-aged pupils.

Cllr Gunn said: “That is a hugely significant increase and the reasons for that are that we have changes to the age range from primary to secondary, and that has resulted in the redesign of areas.”

The executive member for education shared that this meant changes to the curriculum and the facilities provided for these older pupils, including lifts for children with additional mobility requirements.

Rising costs in the construction industry also contributed to the project’s sharp budget spike, though no breakdown of how each of these issues contributed to the new £1.9m price tag was provided.

This additional funding will not be drawn from council revenue, instead making use of either grant moneys or Section 106 funding provided by developers for local services.

Plans to renovate the former dementia care facility on Stansfeld Street into a satellite site of Newfield Special School were first announced in February 2025, with Cllr Gunn detailing earlier this year that it would provide 60 places for children in Key Stage 3 and 4 ‘with diagnoses of Autism and/or Speech, Language and Communication Need’.

This is to serve the ever-growing demand for SEND places within the borough resulting from the increasing number of students with Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCP), which set out their additional needs that must be met by the local authority.

As of January 2026, there are roughly 1700 children in the borough with EHCPs – a 112 per cent increase from 2019.

By creating more in-area placements for SEND children, who Blackburn with Darwen would otherwise have to pay to have their needs met outside of the borough, Cllr Gunn told the executive that the project would still help to cut costs and improve outcomes for young people with disabilities.

Responding to scrutiny from 4BwD’s Cllr Mustafa Desai over how this additional investment would be paid back, Cllr Gunn said: “In terms of payback, the answer to that question is that it’s not a loan it’s money that we have that we can spend in these areas.

“I think what you meant was how it would pay for itself in time by reducing the number of external placements. That’s going to be quite significant for us.

“If we continue to see the increase in children being placed out of borough for their education, that budget is only going to increase to. So the idea is that as children go through their education, generally, they won’t need to go out of borough.”

While this would save the council money, Cllr Gunn added that increasing SEND places in the borough was not just about financial gain, but improving outcomes by ‘having our children educated as close to home as possible.’

Blackburn with Darwen’s executive approved the budget uplift for the Stansfeld Centre project.