Government announces plans for 1,000 Best Start Family Hubs
Parents across the country have been promised more support to make family life easier as the government rolls out ‘Best Start Family Hubs’ across every local authority.
Best Start Family Hubs will act as a one stop shop for parents seeking a range of support, including on difficulty breastfeeding, housing issues or children’s early development and language, reassuring families that they have convenient access to support in their local area or can be efficiently connected to specialist local services.
Hubs will also act as a ‘front door’ to local family help workers for vulnerable families – providing a single point of entry to join-up universal services and children’s social care, ensuring early help before issues escalate.
Responding to the announcement, Tim McLachlan, NDNA’s Chief Executive said, “The roll-out of more Best Start Family Hubs, focusing on support services to families with young children across the country, is a positive step towards reducing inequalities and boosting children’s life chances.
“We know from the nutritious food programme we run with nurseries in the most deprived parts of the country, what a difference that additional support can make for children’s learning and development.
“We all know that the first five years of a child’s life are absolutely crucial. If a family does not have the right access to advice services, health visitors or parenting support then this puts more pressure on early years providers, who can often feel like social workers and benefits advisers.
“These hubs can help us broaden the support for young families so that early years settings can focus on what they do best- caring for, and educating our youngest children.”
Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson said:
“It’s the driving mission of this government to break the link between a child’s background and what they go on to achieve – our new Best Start Family Hubs will put the first building blocks of better life chances in place for more children.
“I saw firsthand how initiatives like Sure Start helped level the playing field in my own community, transforming the lives of children by putting in place family support in the earliest years of life, and as part of our Plan for Change, we’re building on its legacy for the next generation of children.
“Making sure hard-working parents are able to benefit from more early help is a promise made, and promise kept – delivering a lifeline of consistent support across the nation, ensuring health, social care and education work in unison to ensure all children get the very best start in life.”
Best Start Family Hubs will help families with services like:
- Activities for children aged 0-5
- Birth registration
- Debt and welfare advice
- Domestic abuse support
- Early language support
- Health Visiting
- Housing support
- Infant Feeding Support
- Mental health services
- Midwifery/maternity services
- Nutrition and weight management
- Oral health improvement
- Parenting Support
- Reducing Parental Conflict
- SEND support and services
- Stop smoking support
- Substance (alcohol/drug) misuse support
- Support for separating and separated parents
- Youth services
See more on the announcement here.
- England
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