The '2020' campaign was launched last month by groups including Disability Equality in Education and the Campaign for Inclusive Education. Its impetus comes from the experiences of special school 'survivors' - disabled adults who attended special schools and colleges and claim they suffered abuse and isolation.
Richard Rieser, director of Disability Equality in Education, said, 'Special schools are a hangover of 19th century eugenics', and a 'form of segregation'. He added that there was evidence to suggest that they led to 'under-achievement and low self-esteem'.
The campaigners are calling for all local education authorities to develop plans to accommodate all disabled children in mainstream settings and for current segregated provision to be phased out by 2020.
Mr Rieser said, 'A lot of parents get stuck in the idea that their child will overcome their impairment at a special school.'
He pointed to examples,including Ontario in Canada and New Hampshire in the US, where special schools in the maintained sector have been abolished, and said parents should have to pay for special schools.
But the National Autistic Society is calling for greater recognition of the role that special schools play in supporting inclusion. The charity argues that although many children with autism can be educated successfully in mainstream schools, some children have a more inclusive experience in specialist schools.
NAS policy and campaigns officer for children, Amanda Batten, said, 'Special schools play a key role in educating children with more complex needs, and working in partnership with mainstream schools to support greater inclusion. The Government's policy of inclusion should never be used as a rationale for cutting specialist provision, as long as that provision continues to be necessary for any child with autism.'
Linda Lascelles, chief executive of Afasic, which represents children and young people with speech, language and communication difficulties, said that losing specialist speech and language schools would take away essential support for many children. 'Enforced mainstream inclusion without the option of access to special schools isn't the way to go,' she said.
'Going full-time into a bustling mainstream environment will leave some of them isolated, overwhelmed and feeling excluded rather than included. From calls to our helpline, we know this is already happening.'
However, Scope is backing the 2020 campaign. The charity is currently developing an Education Mainstream Strategy to look at ways of changing its services to promote more mainstream education for disabled people. This includes looking at new models of provision to recognise the core competencies needed to support and work with such children and young people.
Chief executive Tony Manwaring said, 'Scope is fully committed in principle to the aims of Disability Equality in Education and the 2020 campaign. It is essential we think through how that commitment can be achieved in practice.
'We believe that no disabled child is uneducable. In the 21st century this must mean societal change so disabled children learn in the mainstream what equality means on a day-to-day basis.'
A DfES spokesperson said, 'Both mainstream and special schools have a big role to play in supporting children with special educational needs. There is no agenda to close special schools. On the contrary, they play an important role with children in their own school or supporting others in mainstream ones.'