Children with special needs are now the focus of the culture war and the budget debate – Labour must tread carefully | John Harris

The yawning gap between funding and demand means that parents are right to fear how the government will reactFor millions of us who have children with special educational needs and disabilities (Send), 2024 was a strange and often unsettling year. For a long time, we have been used to quietly fighting our battles in a political and media vacuum. But suddenly, everything has exploded: as the crisis in provision seems to constantly deepen, barely a week goes by without some or other Send story mak