Even when Sarah Teather assured us that local authorities had been given the budget to maintain existing levels of provision, we knew we had to be worried about a government that kept talking of the wish ‘to take sure start back to the original intention’, and that refused to ringfence the funding provided to local authorities.
Now we’re seeing the chickens coming home to roost. In education questions last week, a series of members highlighted concerns about sure start services in their constituencies facing budget cuts. In my own borough of Trafford, children’s centres face a cut of £289,000 next year.
Ministers now claim that local authorities can cope by making back-office efficiencies and sharing admin and resources across borough boundaries, or rely more on volunteers. But there’s more to it than that. The truth is this government has always preferred to position sure start as a residual service, only intended for the poorest families. The arguments for a universalist approach – lack of stigma, driving up quality, improving access – are all brushed away.
Mixed settings benefit all children, but it’s clear the government attaches no importance to this, as the education bill, which had its second reading last week, has revealed. A little-noticed clause removes the obligation on local authorities to ensure provision for all three- and four-year-olds. Ministers say this is because services will also now be available to two-year-olds from poorer backgrounds – but of course that’s not the only way the clause can be read.
The true and original intention of sure start was to transform the life chances of every child. It was never a quick fix, it will take a generation to see all the good effects come through: this is a programme for life. We’ve learnt much in the first decade of its existence about the importance of reaching out to the most excluded families, and about the importance of quality provision from trained staff, and there’s no doubt further improvements can be made. But too much of the learning’s being ignored in the ideological rush.
This is a tragedy for our children, and one that, sadly, we foresaw. Last year, we were told we were scaremongering. Now it seems that we were right.