EHCP Section F explained: what your child's provision must say

Section F of an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) is the most important part — it sets out the special educational provision your child is legally entitled to receive. Get Section F right, and everything else follows. Get it wrong, and you're fighting for provision the school doesn't have to deliver.

What Section F is

Section F is one of 12 sections in an EHCP (A–K). It specifies the special educational provision the local authority must arrange to meet your child's needs (which are set out in Section B).

Crucially, Section F provision is legally enforceable. If the LA doesn't deliver it, you can take them to SEND Tribunal — and you'll almost always win.

The "specified and quantified" rule

This is the most important phrase in SEND law. Section F provision must be specified (clear about what will be delivered) and quantified (clear about how much, how often, by whom).

Vague: "X will receive support from a teaching assistant."

Specified and quantified: "X will receive 1 hour per day of 1:1 support from a Level 3 TA trained in autism, delivered Monday–Friday during English and Maths lessons."

What Section F can include

Anything that meets your child's identified needs:

• 1:1 TA support — quantified by hours per week and qualifications
• Small-group teaching — quantified by group size and frequency
• Specialist teaching — e.g. SpLD specialist sessions, autism specialist input
• Speech and language therapy (SaLT)
• Occupational therapy (OT)
• Physiotherapy
• Specific resources or assistive technology
• Specific curricular or methodological approaches
• Specific staff training
• External tutoring or alternative provision

How to push back on vague Section F

When you receive a draft EHCP, scrutinise Section F line by line:

• Any mention of "access to" — push for guaranteed delivery instead
• Any phrase like "as appropriate" or "as required" — push for specific frequency
• Any provision without named hours, days or staff qualifications — push for specifics
• Any provision that says the school "will consider" or "explore" — that's not provision

Health vs education

Section F covers education provision; Section G covers health provision (e.g. NHS-funded therapy). The distinction matters because health provision is funded by the ICB (Integrated Care Board), not the LA — and it isn't enforceable through SEND Tribunal in the same way.

Where therapy is needed primarily for educational reasons (e.g. SaLT to access learning), it should be in Section F. This is a common point of dispute — push hard.

If Section F isn't being delivered

Document carefully: dates, times, missed sessions. Raise with the SENDCo, then the headteacher, then the LA's SEND team in writing. If it's not resolved, mediate (free service offered by every LA), then appeal to SEND Tribunal. Most disputes resolve before tribunal — but the credible threat of tribunal often unlocks delivery.

For private tutoring funded through Section F or EOTAS, our SEND tutoring team works with LAs and families regularly.