A term that everyone uses

THE phrase ‘special needs’, a shortened form of special educational needs, is in wide use in schools and public bodies.

Among those who habitually employ it are the staff of Brighton and Hove Council, which informs residents that ‘special needs can be met in mainstream schools’. Should anyone disagree with the council’s decisions about the education of a child, they can take their case to a Special Educational Needs Tribunal.

The Department for Education has legions of officials working in divisions responsible for special educational needs. Its campaign to stamp out disability hate crime included a payment of £1. million to a charity to ‘focus on young people with special educational needs’.

And the phrase is also commonly used by Sussex Police. Last month the force donated £ 00 to a charity that ‘provides support for those with special needs’. So how did it come about that headteacher Janet Felkin found herself under investigation by all three authorities for the same language that is in everyday use by their own bureaucrats and publicists?

The answer seems to lie in the official enthusiasm to pursue those suspected of disability hate crime, no matter that no crime appears to have been committed.

Disability hate crime was added to the list of hate crimes, alongside those which involve discrimination on grounds of race or sexuality, by Tony Blair’s government in 2003. A Criminal Justice Act in that year said any offence should attract a tougher sentence if it was aggravated by hostility against a victim’s disability.

Last month Sussex Police announced that it recognised that hate crime often went unreported. Miss Felkin may comfort herself with the knowledge that, while she faced a devastating investigation for something that no rational person could consider to be an offence, Sussex Police have been able to push up their hate crime statistics.