60,000 vulnerable babies to have A Better Start in life
17 Jun 2014 03:43 PM
There is strong evidence to show that what
happens in the womb and through the first three years of life can profoundly
affect a child’s future.
Tens of thousands of vulnerable babies who may be at
risk of a future of long-lasting health issues, unemployment or even criminal
activity will now have a better start in life following a £215 million
Big Lottery Fund investment to five areas in England.
There is a wealth of research that demonstrates the
importance of a good start in life. Recent research has shown*:
• 35 per cent of toddlers from impoverished inner-city areas are
anaemic1
• more than half of nursery-age children living in disadvantaged
areas have a communication disorder, with as many as 7 per cent in some
cities.2
• 10 per cent of children entering school are obese3
Meanwhile research also shows:
• For every £1 spent on early years education, £7 has to
be spent to have the same impact in adolescence.4
The
areas announced yesterday have been awarded up to £50 million each
- Lambeth, Southend, Nottingham, Blackpool and
Bradford - in a ground-breaking ten year test and learn
initiative to see what methods are the best for laying the foundations for
0-3-year-olds to improve their future health, social and educational outcomes.
The investment aims to improve the life chances of more than 60,000 babies and
children.
A
cross-sector partnership of local health, statutory and voluntary sector
organisations will work alongside local parents in each area to redesign local
services and test how well they can improve social and emotional development,
nutrition, and language and communication development in young children to
prevent costly problems in later life.
Southend and Blackpool plan to
create internationally recognised and renowned centres of excellence and
sources of expertise, bringing together practitioners, researchers and parents
to lead the change in delivery of services.
Across Nottingham activities
will tackle the stress caused by family conflict and domestic abuse, parental
substance misuse, and parental health problems.
Midwives caseloads will be reduced from 100 to 40
in Bradford to enable a more personalised care,
providing more home visits and establishing links with children’s
centres.
In Lambeth more than 50 new
community champions will be recruited in the first year and trained to promote
crucial advice.
Evidence will be produced over the ten years to show
which approaches work best to demonstrate the social and economic benefits of
investing to prevent harm, in order to influence early years funding across the
country.
Dharmendra Kanani, Big Lottery Fund England
Director, said: “Parents want the best for their children and as
a society we know that what happens in the first three years of life profoundly
affects a child’s future life chances. A poor start in life can affect
your health, wellbeing, outlook on life and how you form relationships.
Prevention matters more in the early years as we have a much greater
understanding of what can and might improve the life chances of a future
generation, that is why this investment is focusing on the three key areas of
social and emotional development, nutrition, and language and communication
development.”
The Southend partnership,
which receives £40 million will be led by
the Pre-school Learning Alliance which aims to
transform maternity care, parental support with activities delivered from key
sites including a network of children’s centres with a wide range of
local, voluntary, statutory and health organisations involved. Midwifery and
health visiting services will be increased and there will be improved access to
high quality resources to maximise maternal health during pregnancy. The Centre
of Excellence, Innovation and Best Practice will bring together practitioners,
researchers and parents to lead the development and delivery of services and
systems change. Workshops to improve ‘school readiness’, speech and
language, and address obesity will be introduced alongside breastfeeding
support workers. The partnership expects to improve the lives of 13,000
children in its target areas.
The NSPCC have been awarded £45 million to
lead the partnership in Blackpool which is the sixth most
deprived local authority in the country. Thirty per cent of babies experience
poverty and the town has the highest levels of looked after children in the
country. Work will address low breastfeeding rates, limited prenatal care,
family conflict and domestic abuse, maternal obesity, child poverty, substance
misuse, poor social cohesion and lack of exercise.
Young children will be encouraged to eat more fruit and
vegetables, health professionals will support pregnant women understand the
risks of being overweight and midwives will be trained in newborn social and
communications skills. Community environmental projects will include creating
more open spaces for families to promote the benefits of being active, while
education campaigns will focus on alcohol abuse, domestic abuse and mental ill
health. The establishment of a Centre for Early Child Development will play a
crucial role, aiming to become an internationally recognised and renowned
source of expertise and innovation in services and systems from pregnancy to
the age of three.
Across Nottingham as a whole,
39 percent of children are classed as living in poverty and one in four adults
in the city have no formal qualifications. There are high numbers of children
with early onset behavioural problems, chronic health conditions, unhealthy
gestation and birth, and poor school readiness.
The Nottingham CityCare
Partnership receives £45
million and the project includes activities and interventions
that will tackle the ‘toxic stress’ caused by family conflict and
domestic abuse, parental substance misuse, and parental health problems.
Projects will be delivered within pram pushing or toddler tolerance distance of
all family homes, utilising 16 local delivery centres across the communities.
This will include opening up community buildings in the evenings and
weekend.
All
staff and volunteers in direct contact with children and families will receive
accredited training in communication and engagement, family dynamics and child
development, safeguarding and welfare. A new workforce of paid family mentors
will be recruited and trained work alongside professionals.
Bradford Trident will lead the
partnership in the town which receives £49
million to engage with around 20,000 babies and children over the
ten years. According to Bradford Trident the district as a whole has
significant deprivation and within the three target wards (Bowling &
Barkerend, Bradford Moor and Little Horton) there are high rates of infant
mortality, child poverty, poor oral health, high child obesity rates, low
numbers of school readiness and high rates of domestic violence and child
protection orders. Research shows that one in five children in the three wards
have poor communications skills at the school readiness stage and one in three
children have poor social and emotional development when starting
school.
Midwives caseloads will be reduced to enable a more
personalised care, providing more home visits and establishing links with
children’s centres. A befriender scheme will be introduced for all
expectant and new mothers affected by or at risk of postnatal depression, while
a targeted service working with parents will increase their understanding of
infant brain development. There will also be home-based language development
programmes, outdoor play, story-telling, exercise activities and nutrition
programmes.
In Lambeth,
the National Children’s Bureau, which
receives £36 million, will improve breastfeeding
rates, reduce childhood and maternal obesity, reduce domestic violence, improve
social, emotional, communication and language development. The projects will be
delivered at 26 sites, 13 of which will be enhanced and outdoor plays areas
created. The new spaces will allow all those working with families to use the
same base, share information and work with parents so that health professionals
such as health visitors and midwives will work much more closely with the
council’s family support workers, social workers and ‘community
champions’ to support families in a more coordinated way. More than 50
new community champions will be recruited in the first year and trained to
promote key advice and build connections in the community to reduce the social
isolation of some new parents. A further ten breastfeeding supporters will be
added to the existing team.
Big Lottery Fund Press Office: 020 7211
1888
Out of hours media contact: 07867 500572
Website: www.biglotteryfund.org.uk
Twitter: @biglotteryfund #biglf #ABetterStart
Facebook: www.facebook.com/BigLotteryFund
Notes to editors
*Annual Report of the Chief Medical
Officer 2012, Our Children Deserve Better: Prevention Pays:
*1
Gregory JR. National Diet and Nutrition Survey: Children aged 1.5 – 4.5
years. 1995; London: UK, HMSO
*2 www.stokespeaksout.co.uk
*3
Ridler C, Dinsdale H, Rutter H. National Child Measurement Programme: Changes
in children’s body mass index between 2006/07 and 2011/12. Oxford:
National Obesity Observatory, February 2013
*4
DCSF. The Impact of Parental Involvement on Children’s Education. London:
DCSF; 2008.
-
The Warwick Consortium, led by the
University of Warwick, will measure the impact of this funding and share
learning. The Warwick Consortium includes key figures in early years research
from Oxford University, Ipsos Mori and Bryson Purdon Social
Research.
- The London School of
Economics will establish a robust cost-benefit framework that
will measure the cashable savings to society and the public purse through A
Better Start interventions.
- The Social Research Unit at
Dartington supported the partnerships throughout the process by
providing them with local data, helping them to identify the best evidence and
facilitating community engagement.
- The
Big Lottery Fund has invested an additional £65 million to A Better Start
in order to provide funding to five areas.
- The Big Lottery Fund is
responsible for giving out 40% of the money raised for good causes by the
National Lottery.
- The
Fund is committed to bringing real improvements to communities and the lives of
people most in need and has been rolling out grants to health, education,
environment and charitable causes across the UK. Since its inception in 2004
the Fund has awarded close to £6bn.
- The
Fund was formally established by Parliament on 1 December
2006.
- In
the year ending 31 March 2013, 28% of total National Lottery revenue was
returned to the Good Causes
- Since the National Lottery began in 1994, over £31
billion has now been raised and more than 400,000 grants awarded across arts,
sport, heritage, charities, health, education and the
environment.