DEPARTMENT FOR
CHILDREN, SCHOOLS AND FAMILIES News Release (2007/0124) issued by
The Government News Network on 6 June 2007
Government
launches new plan to help parents by text messages and social networks
Parents will be able to receive text and instant messages to help
them with their children, thanks to a £34m new initiative launched
today by Children's and Families Minister Kevin Brennan.
Using phone helplines and the internet, 'Parent
Know-How' will signpost parents to information and support
services. It will be targeted at people who may struggle to find
the help they need - such as the parents of disabled children,
fathers and those from disadvantaged communities.
Kevin Brennan, Children's and Families Minister said:
"We want to support those parents who seek help with
bringing up their children. By improving phone line support and
setting up text messages, instant messages and social networks, we
will provide help for parents when it suits them best."
Improving telephone support and introducing new methods means
parents can get information when they want it. 'Parent
Know-How' will help with a range of issues like reducing
obesity in children and supporting the victims of bullying,
through to improving educational outcomes.
'Parent
Know-How' will bring together pre-existing resources, such as
parenting helplines, and create new ways for parents to get help,
such as text and instant messages and establishing new social
networks - websites where parents can join together to swap
parenting tips and help solve each others' problems.
This comes on the back of research from 2006 which found that 77
per cent of parents agreed or strongly agreed that they liked
input from professional or published sources on parenting issues.
The same research also showed mothers and fathers have a strong
preference for the internet over other channels, but this was
particularly so for fathers - 63 per cent said the internet was
their preferred channel for information and support.
A 'Parent Know How' Innovation Fund, worth up to £23m
for 2008-2011, will encourage providers of parenting information
and support to focus on new ways of engaging parents.
There will be a competitive procurement process to award
contracts for services that test and demonstrate the ability of
new technologies to reach parents with unmet needs.
Telephone helplines providing parenting support will receive up
to £10.5m grant funding over three years from 2008-2011. This will
be awarded following a competitive grant application process. The
Department will specify the range of topic areas against which it
wishes to fund support, and its expectations for the numbers of
parents to be helped.
These processes are expected to be completed by December 2007.
NOTES TO EDITORS
An advertisement will appear in the OJEU on Monday 9 July and
tender documents will be available from that date at http://parentknow-how.dcsf.gov.uk
Around 18 million people in the UK use instant messaging software
like MSN and Yahoo Messenger; social networking sites like Myspace
accounted for half of the top 10 fastest-growing internet brands
for July 2006.
According to recent figures from comScore - a
global Internet information provider - the UK has the most active
online population in Europe, with the highest average number of
daily visitors (21.8 million), the highest usage days per month
(21 per user), and the highest average time spent per month per
user (34.4 hours).
They also report that the UK is experiencing a rapid growth in
social networking, with sites such as FaceBook having 3.7 million
UK visitors in April 2007, an increase of 38 per cent on the
previous month.
Adults 35-54 now make up more than 40 per cent of MySpace users,
up 8 percentage points in the last year.'
An audit undertaken by Ofcom in 2006 reported that minority
ethnic groups use the internet more frequently (14.5 hours per
week compared to 9.9 for the UK overall). Minority ethnic group
adults (age 16-44) are also more likely to own a mobile phone,
digital TV, have Internet access from home and a digital radio
than the UK average for an adult in the same age.
The Internet
can be a particularly effective channel for providing support and
more specific information, as parents indicate that they often
turn to websites when seeking information that might solve an
immediate problem.
An example of how the Internet and social media are being
utilised by parents can be seen through sites like Netmums that
has 300,000 members, 40 per cent of whom are from low-income families.
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