From the CEO: How do the party manifestos stack up for babies, children and young people?
We have been asking political parties to ensure they put children at the heart of government if elected on the 4th July.
Over the last week, all the main parties have published their manifestos and we’ve taken a look at what policies they contain relating to babies, children and young people.
To grow up happy and healthy, we believe all children need:
- A safe, loving environment to grow up in with secure and nurturing relationships
- Enough resources for a good standard of living
- Whatever specialist help and support they might need, when they need it.
So, how do the party manifestos stack up?
Support for families
Family Hubs
It’s good to see the Conservatives commit to extending their Family Hub model to all Local Authorities. Family Hubs provide a single point of contact for all families looking for support, as well as early years’ activities like those we run at our Cowgate Centre, enhanced perinatal support, and youth groups.
But they get significantly less funding than their predecessor SureStart, which the previous last Labour government rolled out. The Green Party would restore the Sure Start model, with a cash injection of £1.4bn. There is nothing in the Labour or Liberal Democrat plans about this kind of support for families.
Childcare
The Conservatives, Greens, Liberal Democrats and Labour are committed to extending funded childcare for early years. This was announced as a policy last year and is being already being rolled out. The Conservatives are also committed to expanding wraparound care, Labour will invest in more nursery places within schools, and the Liberal Democrats want to increase statutory pay for new parents.
These are all helpful commitments for parents who want to work, but there is no support for those wanting to be able to stay at home and care for their children full time during the critical early years. Reform does offer a solution for this, ‘frontloading’ child benefit for children under four to give families extra resources in the early years, which could offset loss of earnings.
Supporting babies
There is a clear ‘baby blind spot’ across the manifestos, with the word baby mentioned only three times across the five manifestos – and one of those is in reference to the environmental hazard caused by baby wipes.
Parties need to do much more to recognise the importance of the first 1001 days, and commit to supporting families in those days, around bonding, infant nutrition, understanding child development and parental wellbeing, not just focusing on getting parents back to work.
Intensive family support
For families who need more intensive help, there is little sign that this will be forthcoming under the next government, which is worrying for the most vulnerable children and their families.
The 2022 social care review highlighted the urgent need to stem the flow of children coming into care by properly investing in support for families before things hit crisis point. The only party willing to commit to the investment needed is the Greens; Labour would ‘work with’ Local Authorities to support children in care, but without committing to any investment, that we know is so desperately needed.
Both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have committed to better support for kinship carers, which is encouraging, but with numbers of children in care and the cost to the state at a record high, a properly resourced social care system should be much higher priority.
Tackling Child Poverty
With almost a third of children now growing up in poverty, and many regularly going without the basics, we are clear that this should be a top priority for the next government.
Frustratingly, the Conservative manifesto doesn’t mention child poverty at all. Instead, they frame the two-child limit as an achievement – a policy that has pushed over a quarter of a million children into poverty. The only financial help for families is extending child benefit to thousands of high earners, at a cost to the taxpayer over £1bn, but making no difference to low-income and middle-income households.
Both the Conservatives and Reform want to overhaul sickness and disability benefits –predominantly to save the government money – changes that would hit many households with children and risk pushing families deeper into poverty.
Labour have said that Child Poverty is a top priority and promise a national strategy. Many of their policies, if delivered, should make a difference to low-income families. This includes promises on workers’ rights, rental reform and housebuilding. But without committing to any funded measures, it’s hard to see how much impact this strategy would have.
Positively, the Liberal Democrats and the Green Party have both included specific commitments in their manifestos to remove the two-child limit, benefits cap and five-week wait, which we know keep many families in poverty. They will also ramp up housebuilding, with a particular commitment to social housing, and improve rights for workers on low pay and ‘zero hours’ contracts.
Reform don’t discuss child poverty specifically, but have said they would significantly raise the personal tax allowance threshold. This would make a huge difference to many working families living in poverty, but leave households unable to work still struggling.
Support for children when they need it
Mental health
Given the rapid rise in mental health problems among children and young people since Covid, it is brilliant that all the parties except Reform are committing to significantly expanding mental health support for children.
This looks set to include the presence of a mental health professional in all schools, and early help hubs in every community. Both models will focus on early-intervention, working with those who don’t meet CAMHS thresholds, to cut waiting lists and prevent mental health problems becoming entrenched and stopping children from living happy lives.
SEND and neurodivergence
We know many children with additional educational needs, and who are neurodivergent are currently struggling. They face long waits for assessments and support, and many are in school placements not suited to their needs, one factor driving up school absence rates.
The commitment by the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats to a register for children not in school may help, but we need policies that tackle the root issues. All parties are clear in their broad commitment to reducing NHS waiting lists, and we hope this will include paediatric SEND assessments, but there are no specific commitments to this in any manifesto.
The Conservatives have said they will significantly expand the number of special school places, whilst Labour is committed to improving inclusion of SEND pupils in mainstream schools, but without committing any resource. The Liberal Democrats would give local authorities additional funding for schools to put the right support for SEND pupils in place. Meanwhile the Green Party would push for £5bn to be invested in making mainstream schools fully inclusive, with accessible buildings and specially trained teachers, and for local councils to have the funds to support SEND students properly.
The variety in approach reflects the failings of the 2022 SEND reform paper, and lack of clarity about the scale of unmet need and solutions required. The next government needs to commit to a proper independent review, and to be willing to invest the resources needed.
Youth opportunities
For young people navigating the transition to adulthood, the right support at the right time can make a critical difference, but many excellent youth work projects have closed in recent years because of a lack of funding.
Policies on youth in the manifestos are very mixed.
There is a broad commitment for better post-16 training opportunities for young people, including more apprenticeships and vocational training pathways.
Labour, the Green Party and the Liberal Democrats have all indicated a renewed investment in youth work, but under the umbrella of tackling youth crime, rather than recognising the inherent importance and benefits of good quality youth work for all young people.
The Conservatives want all 18 year olds conscripted into a reimagined National Service scheme, either committing to a 12-month stint in the military or volunteering in their community one weekend per month. They claim this will instil a sense of national pride and civic duty, and over £1bn is allocated to the scheme, but we have concerns it will negatively affect those from lower-income families, who are already trying to balance working and studying.
So who should I vote for?
We can’t tell you that. And from our analysis the manifestos are a mixed bag, with no single party offering a clear, coherent vision to make our country a great place to grow up.
The Conservatives have some good policies, and some less inspiring ones, but with a huge blind spot when it comes to child poverty and the devastation it causes.
Labour also lack policy in some important areas like support for families. Whilst they commit to work with local authorities to improve outcomes for vulnerable children, they haven’t set targets and are reluctant to invest, even on subjects they say they are prioritising, like child poverty.
The Liberal Democrats are more robust on tackling child poverty, and the Green Party has been much bolder on committing funding for early years and SEND, and in championing local authority funded Youth Work.
Reform have focused less on these areas where we know investment is needed, but would make changes to tax and child benefit systems which will help low-earners and increase choice for parents of young children.
But these three smaller parties know they have little chance of making it into government, and scrutiny of their costings has revealed weaknesses.
Our work is not done
Whatever the outcome of the election, we will continue to raise our voice to campaign on these issues and hold government to account for how they are using public finances and policy to invest in the next generation so all our children have the chance to thrive.
