Suspensions and permanent exclusions in England’s schools fell in 2024/25, the first drop since the pandemic-era climb began. That’s the headline. But look at who the fall didn’t reach: children with special educational needs and disabilities are still suspended and permanently excluded at far higher rates than their peers, and for the group with the widest gap, that gap actually grew.
In the 2024/25 academic year, schools issued 913,000 suspensions and 9,900 permanent exclusions, both down on the year before. This report sets out what the Department for Education’s official figures show about how exclusions fall on children with SEND, and points you to your rights if it happens to your child.
The first fall since the pandemic
Both suspensions and permanent exclusions fell in 2024/25, the first annual fall in either measure since the post-pandemic climb began.
Suspensions fell from 955,000 in 2023/24 to 913,000 in 2024/25. Permanent exclusions fell from 10,900 to 9,900. Across all pupils, that’s a suspension rate of 10.88 per 100 pupils, down from 11.31 the year before. It’s real progress, but that average still hides a very uneven picture.
Children with SEND are still suspended far more often
The clearest way to see the gap is to compare the suspension rate for pupils with no identified SEN against pupils on SEN support and pupils with an Education, Health and Care plan.
DfE, Suspensions and permanent exclusions in England, academic year 2024/25
Pupils on SEN support were suspended at 4.3 times the rate of pupils with no identified SEN, and pupils with an EHCP at 3.9 times the rate. (Those multiples are our calculation from the DfE rates above.) Note the order: pupils on SEN support, who don’t have the legal protection of a plan, still had the highest suspension rate of all.
Permanent exclusion: the one gap that widened
The same pattern holds, even more starkly, for permanent exclusion, the most serious sanction a school can impose. And here the story isn’t just that the SEND gap persisted. It grew, in the same year every headline total fell.
DfE, Suspensions and permanent exclusions in England, academic year 2024/25
A pupil on SEN support was around 6.2 times more likely to be permanently excluded than a pupil with no identified SEN in 2024/25, up from 5.1 times the year before (our calculation from DfE’s published rates for both years). Suspensions fell. Permanent exclusions fell. This one disproportionality widened anyway. Given that children with SEND are a minority of all pupils, these rates mean they still make up a large share of every permanent exclusion handed out, even as the national total drops.
Disability discrimination law applies to exclusions. A school must not exclude a child for behaviour that is a result of their disability where reasonable adjustments could have been made instead. If your child has been excluded for behaviour linked to unmet needs, that may be unlawful discrimination.
The reason that is recorded
When schools record why they suspend, one reason dominates.
“Persistent disruptive behaviour” accounted for 52% of all reasons given for suspension, and 40% of reasons for permanent exclusion. For a child with unmet needs, behaviour the school reads as disruption is very often communication, distress, or an environment that isn’t working. That’s exactly why the reason recorded on a letter isn’t the end of the story, and why the law asks whether the school did enough first. If you’ve ever read a suspension letter and felt it didn’t capture what actually happened that day, the data backs that up.
Watch for informal exclusions. Being repeatedly sent home early, asked to keep a child off, or put on a reduced timetable without proper agreement is often unlawful, and it doesn’t show up in these figures at all. The official totals are very likely an undercount of how much school time SEND children actually lose.
What this means, and your rights
A national fall in the total doesn’t tell you much about what’s happening to one child, especially if that child has SEND. A suspension or exclusion isn’t the final word, and there are clear routes to challenge one.
Ask for everything in writing and keep the dates. A school must give reasons for a suspension, and you have the right to make representations. Get the reason and the length recorded, especially if your child is simply being sent home.
- Start with school exclusions and your child’s rights, which explains the formal process and how to challenge a decision.
- If the exclusion relates to behaviour linked to your child’s needs, disability discrimination at school sets out the legal protection.
- If your child is on a reduced timetable or is increasingly unable to attend, that guide covers when a reduced timetable is unlawful and what you can do about it.
Methodology and sources
All the suspension and permanent exclusion figures are from the Department for Education’s official statistics release Suspensions and permanent exclusions in England, academic year 2024/25, published 9 July 2026. A suspension is a fixed-period exclusion and a permanent exclusion means the pupil doesn’t return; both rates are expressed per 100 pupils, and because a pupil can be suspended more than once the suspension rate counts events rather than individual pupils.
The rates by SEN status (28.86 for SEN support, 26.45 for an EHCP, and 6.78 for no identified SEN for suspensions; 0.37, 0.27 and 0.06 for permanent exclusions) are quoted directly from that release. The “times more likely” multiples are our own calculation, dividing the DfE rates (for example 28.86 divided by 6.78). The prior-year comparison used to show the widening permanent-exclusion gap (5.1 times in 2023/24) is calculated the same way from the previous release, academic year 2023/24, published 10 July 2025. The reason figures and the year-on-year changes are also from the 2024/25 release. Data accessed July 2026.