National Priorities for Early Years
EARLY YEARS FRAMEWORK
INTRODUCTION
The Scottish Government’s Purpose is to create a more successful country, with opportunities for all of Scotland to flourish, through increasing sustainable economic growth.
The early years are a golden moment and a key opportunity to shape the more successful Scotland of the future defined by the purpose and the National Performance Framework. It is a period of rapid development in children and a period when parents realise they need to adapt to the new responsibilities they face, and are more open to changing lifestyles and behaviours as a result.
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This framework provides a compelling case for and a new vision for early years and follows this through into a series of priorities for action. It provides a model for transformational change that will guide the development of early years and early intervention for the long term.
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The new focus on early years and early intervention will mean a shift of resources from dealing with failure to building resilience and dealing with the root causes of our current social problems. This framework provides a model for improving outcomes through a shift in resources and a starting point for local partners to begin making the decisions that will deliver increasing investment in early years and early intervention over time.
This is a policy for the long term. While there are improvements in childhoods that we can achieve quite quickly, the longer term benefits will only become apparent over the course of a generation or more. This policy is a demonstration that government at national and local level can work together with partners to set a course for a more successful Scotland in the future and we will look to continue and strengthen that partnership as we move forward to implement this policy.
1. EARLY YEARS: THE CASE FOR ACTION
[DN: This section needs some harder numbers added to it]
The majority of our children and young people thrive in the early years and go on to be credits to themselves, their families and their communities. It is clear, however, that if Scotland is to become a more successful country, then we need a focus on giving children the best possible start life. There is room for improvement in a range of outcomes at a national level. In particular we need to focus on those whose lives, opportunities and ambitions are still being constrained by Scotland’s historic legacies and unbroken cycles of poverty, poor health, poor attainment, unemployment and low expectations.
Alongside a strong focus on outcomes, we also need to value quality of life in early childhood in its own right. Effective approaches to early years and early intervention policy will contribute strongly to promoting and upholding children’s rights as defined by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) and indeed those rights must underpin all policy for children.
As set out in the Government Economic Strategy, two of the key elements in delivering an economically successful Scotland are learning skills & wellbeing, and equity. Skills for Scotland highlights that the early years of a child’s life lay the foundations of skills for life and work and have a major bearing on wider outcomes including employment. The Nobel prize-winning economist James Heckman has set out an economic case that shows the rate of economic return on early years investment is higher than for any other stage in the education system.
The recent OECD review of quality and equity of schooling highlights the huge influence of social circumstances on educational attainment in Scotland. Other UK research highlights that the home learning environment in the early years is the largest factor in attainment at age 10, bigger even than the effect of pre-school and primary school. The Millennium Cohort Study provided evidence of significant inequalities in development at age 3 that can persist throughout people’s lives. Supporting parents to provide a stimulating and supportive home environment, particularly in the early years, is therefore a key element in delivering solidarity and cohesion and improving participation and productivity within the Scottish economy.
Scotland’s Chief Medical Officer made the connection between early years and a range of physical and mental health outcomes in his 2006 Annual Report. He particularly emphasised the importance of pregnancy and parenting in defining health outcomes. Parents’ interaction with children in the first years of life is critical in developing attachment and laying the foundations for positive mental health and development. We know that high risk behaviour such as substance misuse, smoking and poor diet during pregnancy and the early years can have a serious impact on a child’s health, development and outcomes. Effective engagement with parents is an important first step in addressing problems, yet those parents most in need are often the least likely to access services. [Perhaps articulate more specifically in relation to HEAT Targets, incl those for adults e.g. smoking]
From the child’s perspective, there is evidence that exposure to high levels of parental stress, neglect and abuse can have a severe effect on brain development. There are clear gaps between the development of children whose parents face such stresses and those being brought up in less stressful households. These gaps continue through life. At age 3, children at higher risk of poor outcomes can be identified on the basis of their chaotic home circumstances, their emotional behaviour, their negativity and poor development. These children face many risks and improving early years support is key to improving child protection indicators. By the time such children reach adulthood, these children are more likely to be unemployed, have criminal convictions, have substance misuse problems and have experienced teenage pregnancy. Improving the early years experiences of these children is therefore a central element of our strategy for regenerating communities, reducing crime, tackling substance misuse and improving employability. It will also help us to break the repeating cycle of poor outcomes often associated with teenage pregnancy.
As well as the lost childhoods and the damage to children, families and communities, the financial costs of failure are enormous. For example, the annual costs of providing intensive secure care for a teenager can be in excess of £200,000 per annum. The costs of impaired health, lack of employment and criminality throughout life could be many times that. There is evidence of a positive economic return from early years investment i.e. spending on programmes that are targeted, high quality and based on an effective methodology can save more than they cost over a number of years. The studies which show a positive rate of return rely on effective targeting of programmes and resources, implying a need for better risk assessment and matching of resources to need within universal services, as well as the availability of more targeted services where needed.
Early years investment is not a magic bullet. There is no single programme or approach that can deliver the improved outcomes we seek. Instead, it will take a concerted and long term effort across a range of policies and services to achieve a transformation in outcomes. The scale of the changes which will be required to bring about these improvements is massive and complex. Service planners and providers may have to take difficult decisions, for example in respect of resource allocation, to shift the focus from crisis management to prevention, early identification and early intervention.
All the evidence is that quality matters in delivering positive outcomes from early years investments. Only through a strong focus on what works and on raising the skills of the workforce that support children and families can we make a difference.
There is life beyond early years and some children and families will need long term support throughout childhood and beyond. We can, however, hope to reduce the numbers of such families through supporting the capacity of children and parents to secure positive outcomes for themselves to the point where it can be self-sustaining within the universal services that are available.
The partners who developed this Framework are convinced and confident that making these changes will benefit current and future generations of children, young people and parents and break the cycles which have held them and their communities back in the past.
2. GIVING CHILDREN THE BEST START IN LIFE
This framework starts from a series of entitlements that articulate what the best start in life looks like for children. It then goes on to set out how parents, communities, services and the workforce can support children and deliver those entitlements.
Our Vision
Children and families are entitled to be valued and respected at all levels in our society and have the right to have their voices are sought, heard and acted upon by all those who support them and who provide services to help them.
Children are entitled to grow up free from poverty in their early years and to have their outcomes are defined by their ability and potential rather than their family background
Children are entitled not to be harmed by alcohol, tobacco or drugs during pregnancy
Children are entitled to have a safe and warm place to stay
Every child is entitled to world class learning and healthcare services that meet their individual needs and which promote resilience and wellbeing.
Children are entitled to safe, stable, stimulating and nurturing relationships with parents that develop resilience and secure attachment. Where parents are unable to provide those conditions, children are entitled to expect the state to move swiftly to provide alternative care that fulfils these requirements.
Every child is entitled to fulfil their potential as successful learners, confident individuals, effective contributors and responsible citizens.
Children and families are entitled to the support they need to help them build resilience and confidence about dealing with their problems themselves, wherever this is possible, and to have the confidence to approach services for help where this is needed.
Young children are entitled to be protected from harm and have their rights respected. Children are entitled to have their welfare put at the centre of decisions made by parents and services, including adult and community services. Children are engaged with rather than judged.
Children are entitled to play outdoors and have an opportunity to experience and judge and manage risk
Children are entitled to good infant nutrition and a healthy diet
Children with disabilities and from minority communities are entitled to have their individual needs recognised and responded to.
In order to deliver the children’s entitlements, there is a need for a number of linked parental entitlements.
Parents are entitled to support to help them understand the responsibilities associated with bringing up a child and to develop the skills needed to provide a nurturing and stimulating home environment
Parents are entitled to world class antenatal, maternity and post-natal care that meets their individual needs
Parents are entitled to be involved in their children’s learning and to learning opportunities that will help them support their child’s learning
Parents are entitled to support to help them access employment and training to help reduce the risk of child poverty. Parents are entitled to support with flexible, accessible and affordable childcare.
Parents and children are entitled to integrated support from services to meet a range of needs they may have. This includes help to address stresses which may impact on their ability to perform their parenting role.
Measuring Progress
The vision is aspirational and long term. It provides a strong sense of direction which will help to guide national and local policy. It now needs to be developed into a set of priorities that will drive change and improvement at the operational level. The National Indicators give us some of the tools needed to turn the vision into operational planning but they do not provide the whole solution.
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In order to assess progress in delivering the entitlements, local partners will also need to consider a wider range of indicators. Some relevant indicators are likely to include:
• Incidence of vulnerable pregnancies
• [GUS and MCS provide info at age 3 but this can’t be broken down by local authority – would need local survey]
• Measures of parental skills/parental readiness
• Rates of mother and father risk behaviours, particularly alcohol, smoking and drug misuse
• Levels of healthy weight/obesity in early childhood
• Infant/child mental health indicators
• Child/parent perceptions of quality of life and quality of services
• Rates of breastfeeding (HEAT Target)
• Participation of children in outdoor play
• Involvement of children in pro-social activities
• Measures of inclusion for disabled children and those from minority communities
[We think these takes too much of a deficit approach. Need help and input from task groups to describe and determine positive indicators along the same lines].
Data for many of these indicators is already available at a local level. Where local monitoring needs to be developed, this should be with the aim of improving service delivery rather than purely as a monitoring tool.
In a number of areas, inequalities in outcomes and entitlements may be particular issues that need to be addressed. The following measures may therefore also be relevant:
• Frequency of premature births
• Infant mortality
• Incidence of low birth weight babies
• Number of children who meet the criteria for child protection registration
• Engagement with antenatal support by young parents and those assessed as vulnerable or at risk
• Identification and treatment of developmental concerns, particularly around communication and language
These are not mandatory indicators but they give a guide to local partners as to how they can measure both the success of early years policies and start to assess whether they are on course to improve a range of higher level outcomes in the longer term.
[Need discussion here of the role of GUS and other SG surveys in measuring progress nationally/locally]
3. TRANSFORMATIONAL CHANGE IN EARLY YEARS
Transformational change is needed in order to deliver the vision and a step change in long term outcomes. This section sets out what that transformational change means for early years.
What does transformational change mean?
For Parents
Prospective parents are aware of the skills, qualities and capacities needed to provide a supportive environment for young children and to make informed decisions about their readiness for pregnancy and parenthood.
Parents protect their children’s health and do not expose them to tobacco, alcohol or drugs during pregnancy or in the early years. They receive support and advice to help them do so.
Parents receive the best support before and after their children are born so that they have the capacity, knowledge, empathy and resilience to ensure that their children get the best possible start in life and that they can learn well in the home environment.
Parents feel confident and trusting about engaging with service providers and know how and where such services can be accessed.
For Communities
Children, young people and families are regarded as assets to our communities
Communities feel empowered and responsible about supporting children and families
For Services
Historic cycles of poor health, poor attainment and other inequalities are broken by shifting the balance of support from crisis intervention to prevention and early intervention
Universal services are empowered and confident about identifying needs and assessing risks. Service providers use their skills to address individual needs and bring in more specialised support where that is necessary.
All services for children, young people and families are planned and delivered in an accessible, flexible and affordable way where providers feel confident about working together to provide a holistic service and sharing information to bring about improved outcomes for all.
Services are ready and able to deal with children and families whatever their circumstances.
All service providers engage with service users and the wider community to ensure that their needs are identified, assessed and addressed
Access to services is not restricted by disability or additional needs, by ethnicity or language, by where people live or their social or economic circumstances.
All service providers develop and implement services which take account of and learn from research evidence and evaluation, best practice and the outcomes from pilot and test projects.
For the Workforce
Children and families are supported by a workforce which is highly skilled, well trained, appropriately rewarded, well supported, highly valued by all and with attractive career paths.
All those who work with children in the early years, whether in the statutory, voluntary or private sectors, are outward looking; confident about working together across organisational and professional boundaries; share information and resources; have strong interpersonal skills and understanding of relationships
Those who work with children and families in the early years are committed to their own continuous professional development and employers provide resources and support to deliver this.
People working in adult services recognise the contribution they can make to outcomes for young children and make this a priority within their service planning and delivery
Delivering Transformational change
To deliver transformational change, first and foremost we need to move to a whole system approach to early years. The current early years service is quite fragmented in terms of service delivery and workforce, and often does not fully integrate the contribution of parents, families and communities to outcomes. The current landscape is represented below.
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A fundamental shift is needed to re-conceptualise the influences on children in the early years to see them as complementary parts of a whole system around the child.
[Case study?]
A focus on building the capacity of children, families and communities to secure outcomes for themselves should be at the heart of this approach. There is a danger that ever greater involvement of public services directly with children simply transfers responsibility away from parents to the state in a way that will not deliver improved outcomes. The responsibility for parenting must therefore continue to lie with parents, supported by services as required. Within this model, we need to pay attention to the role of fathers as well as mothers. Where services do work with children directly, they must focus on building resilience and see part of their role as supporting parents to provide a positive environment for children.
Risks of poorer outcomes for children and families are strongly correlated to underlying factors, mainly poverty and lack of parental qualifications. The early years framework therefore has to be seen alongside other key policies which address underlying factors, particularly the new anti-poverty framework, Curriculum for Excellence, Equally Well and Skills for Scotland. Wider stresses on parents and families such as substance misuse, debt, poor housing and lack of employment can also affect the quality of early years experiences and therefore impact on development. An understanding of the impact of adult services on outcomes for children, particularly in early years and embedding the needs of children at the forefront of the thinking of those services is therefore also an important element of the approach. Wider policies such as those on regeneration, transport and traffic management should also consider the needs of children.
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A central issue for children and parents in the research conducted in support of the framework is the way that services engage with them, in terms of patterns of delivery and relationships with the people delivering those services. This implies a desire for a stronger and more personal relationship with a smaller number of people delivering services that meet a wider range of needs. This in turn, implies a need for service redesign and new roles within the workforce.
At present, the status of many early years services is low and this is reflected in low pay and high turnover in some parts of the sector. This clearly runs counter to the desire of children and parents for high quality relationships and undermines the quality of service being delivered more generally. The early years workforce is overwhelmingly female and this low status is also a significant equality issue. Over time, part of our focus must be to raise the status of early years services and early years workers.
Investment in early years has been increasing but there was a strong feeling coming through from the task group that too much of this investment has gone into small scale projects bolted on to universal services rather than building the capacity of the core services that children and families come into contact with on a regular basis. This has to change. The majority of future investment should be focused on making sure ante-natal care, post-natal health visiting, childcare, pre-school and school are equipped to identify needs and risks, and able then to deliver a service that meets the different needs identified within mainstream services as far as possible. There will undoubtedly still be a role for more specialised services, particularly for children with disabilities and long term conditions, and the small group of families with multiple and complex needs. Where these are required they should be brought to the child and family in line with GIRFEC principles.
Recent biomedical evidence and an increasing body of mental health research has thrown into sharp relief the huge impact of experiences of the foetus during pregnancy and the period between birth and 3 years on a range of outcomes. At present, much of the focus of our approach is on delivering a healthy baby and child, and indeed outcomes in this respect are largely good. There is an urgent need, however, to build the capacity of ante-natal and post-natal services to allow them to focus more on parenting skills and capacity, improve engagement with higher risk groups and provide more effective early intervention to support a wider range of outcomes. The additional capacity may take the form of family care workers or similar workers who can address a range of social needs, integrated into the midwifery and health visiting/community nursing team.
At the moment, there is clear lead from health in antenatal services and from 3 upwards through education. The situation for 0-3 services is less clear, with health in the lead initially but some concern about the universality of contact with parents during this period. The arguments for targeting health visiting resources at families with higher needs is sound, but there is a strong feeling that something has been lost in terms of picking up developmental concerns during this critical period of early language development. A key priority must therefore be to develop a coherent 0-3 service which has clear strategic leadership and enough universal reach to detect and treat a very high proportion of developmental concerns.
Delivery of early years services relies increasingly on partners in the private and voluntary sectors. Indeed, some of the most flexible, engaging, innovative and holistic services are provided through these sectors. There is an almost universal view that partnerships between the public sector and private and voluntary sector providers could and should work better. There are several difficult issues to resolve in moving this forward, but the key areas are around developing more strategic partnerships, developing models of joint delivery involving public and private/voluntary providers, establishing long-term funding arrangements and funding that reflects the real cost of delivering high quality services.
4. PRIORITIES FOR EARLY YEARS
The previous sections outline the outcomes, vision and model of change that will drive the long term approach to early years and early intervention policy. Within that scope, there are many possible approaches and developments that could be considered. A major part of the process of developing this framework has therefore been to harness the expertise of a wide range of organisations, individuals and networks engaged in early years and related policy across Scotland to analyse options and priorities.
These priorities are therefore essentially an expert analysis of the major elements that can contribute to outcomes in and through early years. They encompass social as well as service change, and action by communities and families as well as public services.
The priorities are a mix of national and local issues, and the majority of them include elements of both local and national action. The new relationship between national and local government established by the concordat means that local action must now be based firmly on local decisions. The Scottish Government will no longer dictate a long list of specific actions for implementation at the local level. Instead, the Scottish Government and COSLA have worked together to develop a common framework within which local partners can develop plans, approaches and services that meet local needs and, most importantly, that focus on improving outcomes.
Putting all the pieces together
At the heart of the model of transformational change is a whole system approach to giving children the best possible start in life. The vision and case for action articulate how early years and early intervention contribute to a range of medium to long term outcomes across economic activity, employability, health, education, crime and communities. The model of change encompasses family, community, service and workforce elements.
These elements also need to be brought together at the local level to provide a coherent approach. There is a huge opportunity to move this forward as single outcome agreements are extended to community planning partners from 2009-10. This provides a natural mechanism to develop a whole system approach to early years that could serve as a model for a range of other policy and service developments.
This is not about separate plans or processes from the mainstream community planning system. It is about recognising the opportunity that exists to improve a range of outcomes through a focus on early years within that process.
What we have already done:
• Established a new relationship between the Scottish Government and local government that removes ring-fencing and empowers local government to develop joined-up solutions to local needs
• Agreed the first set of Single Outcome agreements, several of these extending to community planning partners
What more do we need to do:
• Extend Single Outcome Agreements to all Community Planning Partners from 2009-10
• Build on Integrated Children’s Services Plans to develop a local “upbringing plan” that goes beyond services and integrates family and community elements
• Move from joint planning to more joint delivery in early years, with a particular emphasis on 0-3 services to deliver effective early intervention.
A coherent national agenda
There are many influences on children and parents, and many services that support them. It is essential that Government and its partners are working to a coherent agenda so that children and parents receive consistent rather than confusing messages and so that managers and staff can make sense of the policy environment to deliver a set of services which are aligned to a set of common priorities.
The joint policy statement set out four principles of early intervention which can be used to underpin a consistent approach across a range of strategies. These principles have already been reflected in a range of government policies, for example Equally Well, the report of the Ministerial Task Force on Health Inequalities, the drugs strategy Road to Recovery and the youth justice framework.
Curriculum for Excellence is also central to the delivery of the early years framework as learning is the key to many of the national outcomes. It aims to achieve transformational change in Scottish education – enabling all our young people to become successful learners, confident individuals, responsible citizens and effective contributors. This aim is not the preserve of schools. If we are to achieve improved quality in learning and teaching and increased attainment and achievement for all children and young people in Scotland, including those who need additional support, the transformation in education must extend well beyond schools to include early years centres, colleges, universities, employers and the full range of professionals working with children and young people.
This new approach to Government has made a strong start but in many senses is still in its infancy. It will take a significant and ongoing effort to ensure alignment across Scottish Government policies and to ensure this flows through into our relationship with key partners.
What we have already done:
• Established a clear Purpose of Government, National Performance Framework and Government Economic Strategy that set a coherent policy framework
• Published a joint policy statement that establishes a set of principles for early intervention that can apply to a range of frameworks and strategies. These principles have already been embedded in a number of policy documents
• Through the Getting it Right for Every Child programme, started developing key components of integrated service delivery for children and families
• Made significant progress with Curriculum for Excellence which will bring coherence to learning experiences for children from 3-18
• Published Better Health, Better Care and Equally Well, which shows how early years can contribute to addressing health inequalities
• Published Skills for Scotland, the first cradle to grave skills strategy, which highlights the importance of early years in skills development
What more do we need to do:
• Complete our work on the anti-poverty framework
• Continue developing the early intervention principles as a basis for a wider range of social policy
• Bring together these connected policy developments into co-ordinated action at local level through community planning and SOAs
Valuing children, parenting and families
Many elements of the vision are about the value that we place on early years as a society and a sense that a whole range of early years experiences contribute to outcomes. We therefore believe that recognition of the value of the early years is critical to achieving our overall vision.
At the heart of what needs to change is a new attitude to the importance of parents and parenting, particularly in the period before birth and in the very early years of life. Parents themselves must understand the importance of that role for their children’s wellbeing and development. We want people to have the skills and the support needed to support positive outcomes for their children, and this will involve greater self-awareness from prospective parents about their readiness to provide a supportive environment for children. We also need to promote a culture where it is “OK to ask for” and “OK to get” parenting support.
Many people in the wider community already realise the central importance of parenting in children’s attainment, behaviour and health throughout their lives. At the moment, this is too often focused on the teenage years and expressed in blame and recrimination when outcomes are poor. A vital part of this framework’s success will lie in harnessing the community’s desire to see improvements in parenting into valuing and supporting parents to play a positive role in the critical early years of their child’s life.
What we have already done:
• Created a new atmosphere that is about supporting children and families rather than blaming them
• Developed a range of local parenting strategies and programmes
• Supported a range of voluntary organisations to deliver support to parents and children
What more do we need to do:
• Put parenting at the heart of policy through an emphasis on structured support for parenting in antenatal and post-natal services
• [Life-course approach to parenting as proposed by NHS Health Scotland?]
• Promote positive, non-violent parenting and promote awareness of the skills needed to provide a supportive environment for children in a variety of accessible ways.
Improving the physical and social environment for children
The case for change highlights children’s rights and children’s quality of life. Alongside high quality services, this broader experience of childhood will have an important role to play in helping them to be confident individuals, effective contributors, responsible citizens. There is evidence that these areas contribute to good health and a lower incidence of violent and risk-taking behaviour in later life.
It is easy to slip into nostalgia for childhoods of a previous era. We can’t turn the clock back to a time where there was less traffic, more parents at home with children and when the media profile of crimes against children was lower. We can, however, make a commitment to positive childhoods within a modern context.
The areas that we need to address as a matter of urgency are improving children’s access to play and physical activity more generally; addressing parents concerns about safeguarding their children; improving children’s diets; and improving children’s access to enriching culture and leisure opportunities.
Play
We need to ensure that parents, communities and professionals recognise the value and long term benefits of play and to promote how critical play and the arts are for children’s development. This is true not just in terms of physical health but also in terms of developing resilience and mental well being.
We need to recognise children’s own aspirations for play, not what adults think they should be doing and to recognise that play takes many forms, not just play parks.
But we also have to recognise that play and developing the right attitudes to play are not the sole responsibility of national or local government. Parents have a key role here, particularly with regard to the issue of concerns about their children’s safety and exposure to risk. Safety fears were one of the issues highlighted in our research with parents and children to support the framework.
While we must act to limit young children’s exposure to risks they cannot control, giving children responsibility and allowing them to explore the world in a way that is appropriate to their age and development in a way that they can control is a key part of developing confidence. There is a feeling that, in recent times, there has been too much focus on eliminating all risk to children rather than understanding risk. We must reverse this trend and equip children with the skills to manage risk and make positive choices based on assessing the situation facing them.
Children naturally look for role models to guide them in their journey through life. These can be parents, peers, relatives, others in the community and, increasingly, media and sporting personalities. These have an important role in shaping children’s aspirations and priorities, which are strongly linked to outcomes in education and other areas.
What we have already done:
• Increased pre-school entitlement to 475 hours and agreed to increase it further to 570 hours per annum in 2010
• Commissioned baseline research with Inspiring Scotland with a view to establishing a fund to support play
• Trialled nutritious free school meals in P1-P3 and extended entitlement to free school meals to pupils whose parents or carers are in receipt of both maximum child tax credit and maximum working tax credit from August 2009 [subject to legislation?]
• Made a commitment to improving maternal nutrition during pregnancy and children’s diet in the pre-school years [details from Fergus Millan]
• Issued Scottish Planning Policy 11: Open Space and Physical Activity and an updated version of the relevant Planning Advice Note, strengthening protection for existing open space and ensuring future needs of communities are planned for.
What more do we need to do:
• Lead a national debate on risk to children, involving a range of partners, including the police.
• Follow through national policy on open space into local action to provide better access to spaces to play
• Further develop outdoor learning and explore models from other countries such as nature kindergartens
Partnership with families and communities
The largest influences on children in the early years are their parents, with family and the community often also playing a significant role. Improvements in outcomes therefore depend crucially on developing a partnership with parents and communities so that all of the influences on the child are contributing towards positive outcomes.
Families and communities need to be given the opportunity to develop their own aspirations and be given the responsibility, with the support of public services, for taking these forward and assessing how they are progressing.
In particular, community planning needs to get right down to the local level to give local people a sense of ownership and give them some control over how they want early years support to be developed in their community.
Plans and services should be oriented around doing things with people rather than “to” or “for” them. This is critical in developing a capacity-building approach. Parents and other members of the communities should be encouraged to be active participants in early years services through community engagement, volunteering and other routes, and be given the support needed to do so.
Measurement of success should incorporate children’s experiences and community perspectives as far as possible, possibly within a balanced scorecard approach.
What we have already done:
• Made significant progress in many areas in involving local people in community planning
• Published National Standards for Community Engagement to help in the process of building community capacity.
What more do we need to do:
• Further develop the voice of the community, and particularly children, in community planning and the next round of Single Outcome Agreements
• Complete and implement the Community Empowerment Action Plan to help local people play their full part in making Scotland flourish.
• Develop more engaging services in terms of both service design and workforce skills
Developing a culture of family and community learning
We cannot impose aspirations on people, but we can challenge them to take responsibility for their own outcomes and create an environment within which they can determine their own aspirations. This means giving them a stake as active participants and valuing the role that mutual support networks such as parent and toddler groups can have in supporting positive outcomes for children.
We know that when the people around them are involved in learning this can have an important impact on children’s positive development. This is perhaps most directly evident where learning for adults is focused on parenting skills or involvement in their child’s education. However we can also see that, more generally, if people are involved in learning – with the impacts that often has on skills and confidence – that will also benefit their children and other children in their community. Valuing the benefits of parenting education, family learning and wider involvement in learning is therefore a key part of our agenda for giving our children the best possible start in life.
Families provide the fundamental contribution to the care of most of our children but families do not exist in a vacuum – we can sometimes forget that children are also an important part of the communities around them. We know, as well, that communities care deeply about the children growing up around them.
A huge amount of activity goes on ‘under the radar’ in communities across Scotland, providing support, opportunities and, sometimes, a voice for children and their families. Networks and community groups – whether formal or informal, and whether explicitly focused on issues for children or not – therefore have an important part to play in improving the wider, supportive environment in which children grow up. We want to see that contribution supported and expanded.
Support for that activity takes place across Scotland through specialist community development or community capacity building work. That support can be provided by a range of organisations in the statutory and voluntary sectors (including, in some instances, organisations which focus on providing services to children and families). It can play a particularly important role in building capacity with communities who are disadvantaged by poverty or other factors.
This isn’t about imposing external views of what issues should be important to communities. Rather it is about ensuring that support to build community networks and organisations – around the issues that matter to communities themselves – is co-ordinated and its contribution recognised.
Some may question whether such approaches can work in a society where, in many families, both parents work and have a range of other pressures. We believe there is good evidence to suggest that busy parents can engage in community and mutual support activities and that the least engaged are those in workless households. [Ref to ESOL to come from Sean Stronach’s team]
Services will have a role to play in bringing this to fruition. There is much that we can do to reorient services to be engaging, give parents and communities a stake in outcomes, support mutual support initiatives and, most of all, to be based on building the capacity of not just the child but the parent, family and community within which they live.
What we have already done:
• [Joint statement on CLD]
What more do we need to do:
• Place a higher emphasis on community capacity-building as a means to secure improved outcomes
• Make every pre-school and school a family learning environment which encourages parents to support their children’s learning and to pursue their own learning as a means of doing so
• Support mutual support networks such as parent and toddler groups at the local level as a key means of improving outcomes
Embedding the Principles of Getting it Right for Every Child
Getting it Right for Every Child is the foundation for all action with children, young people and families and is based on building from universal services to meet the range of individual needs. The approach has established a set of 14 principles and values and 10 core components for working with children It puts the child firmly at the centre of planning and action and promotes a shared approach that builds solutions with and around children, young people and families.[put these in an annex].
GIRFEC applies to all children, whatever their level of need and to all agencies. At the heart of the approach are streamlined planning, assessment and decision making processes that lead to the right help being provided at the right time for children to address all their needs and risks. The emphasis is very much on improving outcomes, delivering a holistic approach to meeting the child’s needs. Other elements of the GIRFEC approach encompass, amongst other things, common values, information sharing, risk assessment models and the development of a lead professional role. All of this requires a shift in culture, systems and practice if the desired outcomes for children are to be achieved.
All of these elements were identified by the task groups as being important in the way forward for early years. Delivery of the early years strategy is therefore fundamentally dependent on how agencies, services and communities work to achieve Getting it Right for Every Child and its effective implementation at national and local levels.
GIRFEC already encompasses action by adults to improve the support they give to their children, and the child’s plan can include action by adult services. This is an element of the approach that is still relatively immature, although it is prominent within the domestic abuse pathfinders.
What we have already done:
• Supported the Pathfinders which are testing the GIRFEC approach at the local level
• Developed a range of tools to support the GIRFEC approach
• Created a learning structure so that all partners can start to develop the approach
What more do we need to do:
• Embed GIRFEC across all services in all parts of Scotland
• Over time, move from the position where a child’s plan can include adult services elements to one where these should be included where they can make a contribution to outcomes for the child.
• [Places that GIRFEC isn’t really reaching yet – A&E Departments, children’s hospitals?]
Strengthening universal provision as a basis for prevention and early intervention
The model for transformational change puts the onus firmly on universal services as key agents in delivering improved outcomes. A lot of people doing at least a little to effect change will achieve much more than a few people doing a lot within an early years context.
Breaking the Cycle
The pre-conception stage is one of the areas of greatest opportunity. Motivations for pregnancy are complex and there is evidence that raising aspirations, reducing the number of people with low or no qualifications and enhancing life skills are more important than sex and relationships education in preventing vulnerable pregnancies. Curriculum for Excellence provides a vehicle through which a greater focus can be developed on meeting the needs of young people to develop the qualities that will equip them to make positive choices about pregnancy and parenthood. Schools, youth work, social work and adult services all have an important role to play, and indeed the quality of the relationship between a key person and the young person or adult can have a critical bearing on their life choices. These services cannot do this alone, however, as aspirations depend to a large extent on family and community. This reinforces the importance of whole-system approaches to these challenges. For young women who do get pregnant and choose to continue with their pregnancy we need to ensure that they are able to continue or re-enter education to improve their levels of educational attainment and opportunities to become socially and economically active in the future.
Sexual health and relationships remains a core issue, and in particular how people at greater risk of poor outcomes access good quality contraception and family planning advice to assist with the timing of pregnancies which will lead to the best outcome for them and their child. There are three critical areas that we need to focus on: more engaging sexual health education and services for young people through accessible drop-in services; integrating sexual health advice and treatment into services for high risk groups such as looked after children and substance misusers; and improving the way that contraception advice is offered at key points such as post-birth and in termination clinics.
Antenatal and Post-Natal Support
All families come into contact with health services during pregnancy, birth and in the first few years of life. This contact provides opportunities for prevention, early detection and early intervention and opportunities to connect children and families to supports within their own communities. For those with higher needs, provision through the universal service provides an opportunity to work with families in a non-stigmatising way.
A key priority is enhancing the capacity of antenatal and post-natal services to provide an integrated set of medical and social supports that build parenting and family capacity. This does not necessarily mean more midwives and health visitors, but rather building up capacity to deal with a wider range of social needs to support and complement their role. Equally Well highlights the importance of combining this with enhancing the capability of antenatal services to reach and support vulnerable families. Antenatal booking is the first universal contact and should be the start of a process of dynamic risk management throughout pregnancy. A primary focus of antenatal services will continue to be providing care and monitoring wellbeing of mother and baby [but with an increasing focus on preparing for parenthood as time progresses].
[Something about increased evidence of criticality of maternal behaviour and maternal stress during pregnancy?]
Evidence on the health benefits of breastfeeding for both mother and infant is compelling and all women should receive enough information and skilled support to let them make an informed decision on how they will feed their baby. Support should be available for all women in initiating and maintaining successful breastfeeding. Additionally, establishing good nutrition and developing healthy weaning practices is essential and will influence children’s immediate and long term health.
Health for all Children 4 advocates access to a set of core evidence-based interventions throughout childhood while identifying and targeting those who need additional support. The purpose of the universal health service is well defined and includes monitoring the physical, social and mental health needs of each child, screening, immunisation, parenting support and advice tailored to the individual needs of each family. The first three years of a child’s life should set the blueprint for their social, physical and emotional wellbeing throughout childhood and into adulthood. All contact should promote engagement between parent/carer and child and identify those families who need additional structured parenting support.
[Link to Equally Well test sites]
[Do we need a section in here on early intervention through early years services and extending their reach amongst 0-3s?]
Pre-School into Primary
The concordat already sets out a number of areas where universal services will be strengthened during the pre-school and early primary phase:
• Reducing class sizes to 18 in primaries 1 to 3
• Expanding pre-school entitlement
• Providing access to a teacher for every pre-school child
• Focusing the education system on outcomes through Curriculum for Excellence
These developments will benefit all children, but they have a particular value in providing additional capacity to allow universal services to play a greater role in early intervention. For example, smaller class sizes mean that teachers will have more time to spend with individual pupils and scope to provide more targeted support to build confidence in communication, literacy and numeracy at this critical early stage.
Councils will have responsibility for bringing these policies together into a coherent package at local authority, cluster and school/centre level that is focused on improving outcomes for children during pre-school and the early years of primary.
[Police?]
A continuum of support
Another area that came through in the work of the task groups was the importance of continuity and a coherent approach from family planning, through pregnancy, birth, family support, pre-school and into school. Childcare, play and adult services that have a significant impact on outcomes for children such as employability also need to connect into this system.
Delivering early intervention through universal services
Each local area should have a universal set of supports for every child and family at a level and a quality that meets a set of core needs (family planning, parenting capacity/skills, mental health of both infant and parents, nutrition, childcare, education, family learning, employability, play and leisure) and which is based on building self-efficacy at every stage.
Within universal services, there needs to be the capacity to provide additional support and early intervention for families facing greater challenges, whether on a temporary or more long-term basis. Wherever possible, universal services should take responsibility for providing that additional support rather than referring onwards, in line with the principles of GIRFEC. This has implications for both capacity and workforce skills/roles, as a higher dose of the same type of service will not meet all types of additional need.
The parenting task group developed a model that illustrates how a strong core programme can be combined with additional and intensive supports to meet varying levels of need and deliver a continuum of support. This was based on the Child Heath Promotion Programme [check] from England, adjusted to include a number of changes to make it more relevant to Scotland. It focuses on parenting rather than early years as a whole and currently has some limitations in that it defines need at three distinct tiers rather than a continuum as envisaged by GIRFEC. Nevertheless, we believe the model has value in framing a debate about the core programme needed to meet the needs of children and families in early years and how to combine universal and targeted services to deliver the additional and intensive supports. [Possible action to set up an expert group (or use members of one or more of the task groups) to develop this further?]
[Directory of services idea?]
[?Incentive schemes for hard to reach groups to engage with the available supports?]
In some cases, additional needs can be met through an enhanced level of access or entitlement to universal services, for example subsidised childcare or earlier entry to pre-school. At the moment, there is a feeling that some of these additional entitlements are not offered within a consistent framework or based on an assessment of local needs or the contribution they can make to outcomes.
Meeting individual needs
Individuals can have different or higher needs for a variety of reasons, including language, ethnicity and disability, as well as social circumstances.
Universal access and universal uptake are not the same. If we are to reduce inequalities and embed early intervention within universal services, then services must pay attention to whether they are reaching minority communities and those with higher needs and then meeting those needs. This should be reflected in local performance management and accountability arrangements.
[Something about avoiding over-reliance on written materials in key areas such as health promotion and parenting as those who need it most find this least helpful]
Transitions
Transitions were also highlighted as an important issue in the research with parents and children. The major transition points for children highlighted in the research with parents and children were the transfer from midwifery support to health visiting support in the days after the birth, the transition into pre-school and the transition from pre-school into primary.
Curriculum for Excellence provides an important opportunity to improve transitions between pre-school and primary. The early level will span pre-school to the end of primary 1 and the increasing use of active learning in early primary means that there should be a smooth transition in learning style. There are still several challenges to overcome, however, not least creating an effective dialogue between primaries and nurseries (including private and voluntary sector centres) about respective contributions to early level outcomes. Establishing such a dialogue is crucial to delivering continuity of learning, which is a key principle of Curriculum for Excellence.
Transitions in the life of adults can also have a major impact on young children. For example, bereavement or family breakdown can have a profound impact on young children in particular. Mediation and counselling services generally already have a strong focus on the needs of children. [Any issues we need to reflect here?]
Sustaining the intervention
The aim is to set children off on a trajectory where they can achieve positive outcomes within the mainstream of universal services. Much can be achieved through early years and early intervention, but there will always be children and families who need continuing support.
It isn’t enough for such families to support them effectively in the early years. Benefits from early intervention will fade quickly if family stresses increase, relationships with children come under pressure and peer relationships start to have a negative influence. It is important, therefore, that there is capacity to meet an ongoing level of need throughout childhood, and possibly throughout life. The aim must be, however, that early intervention will reduce the numbers of people requiring such ongoing support over time.
[Something specific about support available in/alongside schools]
What we have already done:
• Increased pre-school entitlement to 475 hours and agreed to increase it further to 570 hours per annum in 2010
• Made a commitment to reducing class sizes to P1 to P3 and providing access to a teacher for every pre-school child as quickly as possible
• Introduced a framework for learning based on the principle of personalisation and choice
• Made a commitment to the development of skills for learning, skills for work and skills for life through Curriculum for Excellence
• Made clear our commitment to Gaelic and to Gaelic medium education.
What more do we need to do:
• Deliver on the class sizes and pre-school concordat commitments
• [Final step in delivering 50% increase in pre-school entitlement in 2011]
• Implement Curriculum for Excellence in a way that meets the needs of all learners and which improves transitions
• Continue to work on and complete the review of Gaelic early years provision in order to establish levels of access and availability.
• Improve the ability of antenatal services to reach high risk groups
• Identify and deliver a universal set of supports for every child and family at a level and a quality that meets a set of core needs (family planning, parenting capacity/skills, mental health of both infant and parents, nutrition, childcare, education, family learning, employability, play and leisure) and which is based on building self-efficacy at every stage.
• Develop capacity within universal services to provide additional support and early intervention for families facing greater challenges, whether on a temporary or more long-term basis
• Review implementation of Hall 4 to strengthen the core programme. Increasing the capacity of antenatal and post-natal services to deliver structured parenting support.
• [Something about expanding centre-based provision for 0-3s]
• Provide more accessible drop-in sexual health services for teenagers
• Further integrate sexual health advice into services for high risk groups
• Improve contraception advice in termination clinics
• Increase the life choices available to young women at risk of teenage pregnancy or who become pregnant as a teenager to improve their social and economic circumstances which will break the cycle of deprivation often caused by teenage pregnancy
Services based on what works in supporting children and families
There are a wide range of services in place for children and families and a huge number of very skilled and committed people in the children’s services workforce. In order to get the best from services and the workforce, they need to operate with a strong understanding of what works in supporting positive outcomes for children.
We have excellent practice in many sectors and in many locations across Scotland. However, there was a strong feeling that came through from the task groups that we need to be more systematic in identifying and disseminating best practice.
We need to capture what the evidence tells us about the nature of effective practice, learn from innovative approaches in Scotland and elsewhere and develop a culture of learning within the workforce so that they can apply the evolving knowledge base for the benefit of children and families.
A particular focus will be developing the evidence base on information, advice and programmes to develop parenting capacity. A further priority will be on building the evidence base around what works in community learning and development to support positive outcomes in early years.
Understanding the evidence is not enough. Some of the biggest mistakes are made in attempting to adapt proven programmes to local needs an unwittingly diluting those elements that are most effective. A strong emphasis on programme fidelity, training and compliance needs to be maintained throughout the delivery chain.
What we have already done:
• Published a review of evidence on parenting support as part of the work on Equally Well
• [Something from Joint Statement on CLD?]
What more do we need to do:
• Ensure that parenting support is based on programmes which have a proven track record and evidence base. Examples are Triple P, Mellow Parenting and Incredible Years
• Place greater emphasis on programme fidelity in delivering parenting programmes
• Develop a more structured means of translating evidence and best practice from a range of sources into service delivery
Services that meet the needs of children and families
The quality, availability, accessibility and flexibility of services are key components in meeting the needs of children and families. The feedback from parents and children involved in qualitative research that was carried out in support of the framework was very clear in highlighting several areas where service design needs to evolve to better meet their needs.
We also recognise the importance for the Gaelic speaking community of the availability of Gaelic early years education and childcare. This is a legitimate expectation and is a key part of our aim of creating a secure future for Gaelic in Sotland.
Quality
There is a large body of research which reinforces the central role that quality of services plays in delivering improved outcomes in early years. That research also highlights the qualifications and quality of the workforce as by far the largest factor in this. Quality is therefore not an optional extra in early years services. It must be at the heart of service design and delivery. [Link to quality frameworks – existing ones for pre-school, childcare, school etc; poss new ones for antenatal, maternity and post-natal services?]
Improving the quality of services through raising the quality of the workforce carries both an initial cost in terms of training and an ongoing cost in higher salary expectations. There is therefore a tension between quality and affordability, and in some cases flexibility. There is no point, however, in delivering services that are cheap but low quality, as these are essentially a waste of resource that could be making a greater contribution to outcomes. Instead, the focus should be on how to make quality affordable and flexible.
Quality is not just important in terms of services delivered directly to children and families. The Growing up in Scotland survey highlights the huge contribution that grandparents make to children’s lives both generally and specifically in terms of informal childcare. Many children spend a lot of time with grandparents and other relatives and it is important that such informal carers have access to support to help them fulfil this role. Developing mutual support networks of informal carers and giving informal carers access to the same sort of supports as parents could provide significant benefits in this context. Evidence from GUS suggests that there are some areas where support for such initiatives could focus, such as healthy eating.
Flexibility and Integration
A particular concern for parents is the way that childcare integrates with pre-school education and school, and this view was reinforced by the services task group. Improving the accessibility and affordability of high quality, flexible, integrated pre-school and childcare services is therefore a priority.
[Do we need to say something about expectations on parents regarding employment]
There is a need to balance the needs of children with the needs of parents. High quality care can help to ease this balance by conferring benefits on children whilst providing the opportunity for parents to work. There is some conflicting evidence about the time it is healthy for children to spend in group childcare, particularly under the age of two. These arguments are not clear cut, because the ability to work can lift a family out of poverty and this is strongly correlated with improved outcomes for the child. The presence of a child in childcare services can also provide a non-stigmatising context for a range of other supports to be provided. The balance will be different for every child and family, depending on their circumstances. What is important is that parents are supported to find the right balance for them and that availability of flexible, high quality, integrated services is improved to meet those needs.
The need for greater integration between pre-school and childcare is only part of a wider demand from parents for more joined up services. Other areas they identified included better integration between midwifery and health visiting services.
[Need link to youth framework and poss. Childcare for older children]
A more flexible and integrated workforce can play an important role in meeting these needs, alongside streamlined processes being delivered through GIRFEC. While there will continue to be a strong role for specialists in health, education and social work, there will also be a increasing emphasis on roles that span disciplines and which can support a range of needs. This is particularly important for families who have a greater range and intensity of need. [Link to key workers?]
Affordability
Some services are clearly defined as free entitlement whereas others have traditionally had a cost associated with them e.g. parents generally pay for childcare and a number of culture and leisure services. Reducing such costs across the board through universal supply-side subsidies would mean applying large amounts of resource to families which are already doing relatively well. Such costs clearly weigh heavily, however, on those on lower incomes. The real challenge is how to construct a progressive and non-stigmatising way of supporting these costs that is simple and more accessible for parents.
By far the largest cost tends to be associated with childcare, and the Westminster Government has established two separate schemes to support parents with these costs – the childcare element of working tax credit and childcare vouchers. It is clear that uptake of both schemes is lower than it could be and this is, in part, linked to the complexity of tax credits and the lack of awareness amongst employers of the benefits of childcare vouchers. In the short term, the Scottish Government will work to influence the UK Government to simplify the tax credits system and promote greater availability of childcare vouchers in the public and private sectors.
There are particular problems for some families within the current system. The limits on the amount of childcare costs which can be supported work against larger families and those with disabled children, who face higher costs and, in many cases, a higher risk of poverty. We will use our influence with the UK Government to improve support for these groups.
In the longer term, we believe the current position of having two overlapping systems is unsustainable. The Scottish Government has argued for, and will continue to promote, the creation of a single, progressive and accessible system for supporting parents with the costs of childcare. Ideally, we would wish the Scottish Government to have the powers to establish such a scheme using the money currently expended in Scotland on the existing UK-wide schemes.
Other areas such as culture, leisure and transport have smaller costs associated with them, but are still important issues for parents and children. Parents argued for greater free access to leisure facilities in particular to promote health and address concerns about obesity.
Accessibility
Early Years services already play a very strong role at the heart of communities. Pre-school, school, playgroups, mother and toddler groups and health services are highly valued and, for most people, are readily accessible [Evidence – SHS?].
Even where facilities are accessible, some people find it hard to get the greatest benefit from these. This can be because they are afraid to ask for additional help that they need or because of other barriers such as language, disability or social circumstances. In other cases, vulnerable people fear the consequences of engaging with certain services such as sexual health services or social work. There is a real risk in these circumstances that those who would benefit most from support are least able to access it. Particular priorities identified by the task groups are picked up within the local action section.
The availability of transport to allow them to access key services was an issue for a significant number of parents.
Advice and information services
Families need access to a range of advice and information services in order to help them understand their own role and to make informed choices about parenting and services. As well as advice available from professionals such as midwives and health visitors, there are also a wide range of advice services and helplines that support families. These include childcare information services, tax credits helplines, parenting advice lines, mediation and counselling services, and a whole variety of wider advice services in areas such as debt.
At present these services are very fragmented. We believe the way forward is for Childcare Information Services to become family information services and act as a gateway for a range of advice that parents may need. The voluntary sector, in the shape of [?Parenting Across Scotland?] have already started to deliver a more joined up approach to parenting advice services and local authorities will need to consider how best to work with the voluntary sector in developing a more integrated advice service.
Parents’ awareness of the advice that is available is often low. There is a role for better marketing of advice services through universal services. This needs to be creative and go beyond written materials to more proactive work in health, education and community services and centres.
Meeting the highest levels of need
There will continue to be a need for specialist services for those with the greatest levels of need, including a range of specialist services for children and families with specific conditions and disabilities [ref specialist children’s health services plan].
A particular area where there is unmet need at present is intensive, holistic support for families who face a range of interconnected social and medical challenges. For example, some families in greatest need have a complex combination of substance abuse, employability, housing, debt, mental health, parenting and other problems that would be difficult or impossible to address in isolation. Estimates suggest that between 2% and 4% of families face such complex challenges.
More consistent access to intensive family support services should be a priority, and families with young children should be a priority for these services. There are several models that could be considered at the local level, based on intensive, structured interventions such as Nurse Family Partnership, Functional Family Therapy and Multi-Systemic Therapy or the Dundee Families Project model. These may be costly and resource intensive, but in addition to their positive impact on outcomes, they are likely to cost less than a quarter of what institutional care of such children would. There is likely to be a strong role for partnership with the voluntary sector in this area, and in some areas it may be that partnerships between local authorities will be required to bring projects to fruition.
What we have already done:
• Announced our intention to introduce a Bill in Parliamentary session 2008-09 to protect rural schools which are key to accessibility of services in many areas
• Pressed the UK Government to simplify support for parents with the costs of childcare and to improve the level of support available for larger families and families with disabled children
• Started developing joint roles which can span a number of services to provide a more integrated service, starting with a joint health and social care role
• [Started work to promote uptake of childcare supports that are available]
• [Published a National Transport Strategy]
What more do we need to do:
• Increase availability of flexible, integrated education and childcare services
• Further develop joint roles in the workforce that can work across health, education and social care and which would be deployable across antenatal, post-natal, pre-school, school and social work services.
• Provide better support for grandparents who play a significant role in caring for children
• Address local transport barriers to early years services
• Develop a clear view at local level as to how to encourage access to leisure and cultural activities by young children and their families
• Provide more consistent access to intensive family support services
• Change the role of Childcare Information Services so that they can become Family Information services, encompassing advice on parenting support and linking to advice on tax credits. Making their role more proactive and linking effectively to sources of support from the voluntary sector
Common values across the workforce
The values that we bring to our relationship with children in the early years are important at a societal level but they are particularly important for those who work with children and those whose work has a major impact on children, such as adult services and community learning and development workers.
There are many parts to the early years workforce with no agreed definition or boundary as to what constitutes a children’s worker or an early years worker. There are many different roles and sectors within the workforce, each with its own focus, culture and, in some cases, regulatory system.
Some of these differences are necessary and legitimate, but in order to emphasise the importance of a holistic approach, and to give greater coherence to the many supports available to children and families, we need all of those working with children and families to be working to common values.
As noted above, a set of core values and principles has been developed as part of Getting it Right for Every Child. We do not want to create a separate set of values for early years, and our approach will therefore be to take the GIRFEC values as a starting point.
Some of the changes in workforce roles and skills flowing from this framework are likely to be profound. All local partners will have a role in leading a debate with their respective workforces about the future roles and organisation of the workforce across early years. This should be a process of genuine debate and discussion which encourages staff to take ownership of the agenda.
[There is something deeper in the workforce report about valuing the workforce more. That (and how to make it happen) doesn’t really come across at present. Also gender segregation.]
What have we already done:
• Started developing common values and principles as part of GIRFEC
What more do we need to do:
• Build on this by establishing a set of core values for the early years workforce that can be embedded in training and CPD
Developing a highly skilled workforce
A theme that came through in the work of all four task groups was the importance of the skills base of the workforce. There is a significant evidence base that supports the link between qualifications and outcomes, but equally our research with parents and children highlighted the central importance of engagement and the attitude of those they deal with in terms of their perception of the quality of services.
There are many excellent examples of cross-sector working within initial education, of joint working across higher and further education, and of partnership between educational institutions and employers. However, it remains the case that there are different silos of training for professional groups.
We know there are a plethora of Continuing Professional Development (CPD) opportunities available across the workforce, but that some people receive more opportunities to develop their skills than others. There are sectors where access to training can be very limited, such as childminders, playworkers, parent committees and some voluntary groups.
There is an opportunity to create a much more coherent approach to developing the skills of the workforce, spanning initial education and CPD. This would flow, in part, from the Common Values Statement and the actions above to develop a much more systematic approach to capturing evidence of what works in children’s services, and be based around a conceptualisation of the children’s service workforce of the future.
The parenting task group highlighted early communication, literacy and numeracy development and strategies for building the capacity of children and parents as a priority for inclusion in initial training and CPD across the workforce.
As we move forward in implementing Getting it Right for Every Child, there will be an increasing emphasis on skills which equip people to act as lead professionals and to provide or arrange additional support where a need is identified. These are important skills which should be a priority in CPD going forward.
[Ref forthcoming workforce response to Better Health Better Care]
There will be a need for innovation in roles and skills at a local as well as national level. Local partners should create an environment that supports and encourages innovation, and which gives backing to staff who find new ways to give greater emphasis to engaging families, developing prevention & early intervention and building community & family capacity. Most of all, staff must be clear that delivering for children and families across a range of outcomes is the day job for everyone.
There is a clear role for local early years and family support partnerships in rationalising and prioritising CPD opportunities to focus on those areas that make the greatest contribution to national and local priorities in early years.
What we have already done:
• Launched the Standard in Childhood Practice
• Made a major investment in raising the skills of the early years workforce
What more do we need to do:
• Improve access to training and CPD for groups who do not find it easy to access at present, including workers in the voluntary sector and childminders
• Develop specific early years skills in the teaching profession through initial training and CPD
• Place greater emphasis on communication, literacy and numeracy in the training of all early years workers
• Make engagement skills a core part of what we expect from early years workers
• Make sure early years workers are equipped to act as lead professionals and to engage in inter-agency approaches
5. DELIVERING CHANGE
Combining national and local action
Putting this agenda into action requires action at both national and local levels. National actions are largely about developing our understanding of key issues, creating the conditions for change and providing structures and supports for local partners. Local action flows from the same priorities and is based firmly on improving outcomes at the local level through single outcome agreements.
[Some sort of ongoing national structure?]
Single Outcome Agreements
Single Outcome Agreements are a key mechanism for bringing local partners together to identify priorities and actions to improve outcomes. They are also a key mechanism in the relationship between national and local government through which shared priorities can be developed and progressed. We therefore need to define how the early years framework will relate to Single Outcome Agreements in 2009-10 and beyond.
The Scottish Government and COSLA will be developing guidance for Community Planning Partners that will support the preparation of SOAs from 2009-10. Our intention is to set out in this guidance how key priorities such as early years and early intervention should be reflected in SOAs.
A key principle is that SOAs are agreements between local authorities and the Scottish Government. Therefore, while local partners will have responsibility for putting together a package of measures that reflects this framework, the Scottish Government will want to see clear evidence of how these priorities have been reflected before agreeing to individual SOAs. There is scope for local partners to innovate and be creative, but where they choose to depart in whole or part from the analysis provided by this framework, they will need to provide a clear and convincing rationale for doing so.
The Scottish Government supported the first round of Single Outcome Agreements through a set of Directors who worked alongside local authorities. [We will extend this approach to the 2009-10 SOAs where one of the roles of these Directors will be to advise and support authorities on how to incorporate some key frameworks within SOAs. The Early Years framework will be one of these].
Leading Change
The scale of change required at local level is such that leadership from community planning partners will be vital. Only through the engagement of leaders in health, local authority and voluntary sectors can a whole system approach be developed that will drive changes in relationships and delivery which are needed to deliver the best possible start in life.
Leadership is not the preserve of politicians, Chief Executives and strategic managers. Leadership by service managers, team leaders and other frontline managers will be just as important as we move forward. [Need to develop this argument]
Strategic Planning and Delivery
It is implicit in all of the foregoing priorities that an integrated approach to planning and delivery is required and the natural home for this is within the community planning process.
While many areas have made significant progress in community planning in recent years, the task groups felt that evidence of integrated delivery was more limited. If we are to improve outcomes as we all aspire to, then community planning partners will need to place a particular focus on joining up delivery around children and families to provide the continuum of support that is needed.
Some members of the task groups argued for a rapid move towards a single early years budget across various agencies and eventually bringing all early years services into a single management structure. However, others argued that this could be time-consuming and distracting and that it was more important in the short term to create the conditions for better joint working through an organisational development approach. Our conclusion is that there is no single solution to joining up delivery on the ground and that the needs of different parts of Scotland are so diverse as to make any single approach impractical. Equally, there is a strong sense that the status quo is not an option because the complexity of existing delivery structures is a barrier to some of our objectives around engaging parents and delivering a holistic service. Local partners should therefore set a medium term plan for simplifying the delivery of early years services and consider whether there is scope for simplification of budgets and organisational structures to support that. There should be a particular emphasis on streamlining the approach to 0-3 services where there is perceived to be the greatest degree of disconnect and overlap at present.
[Link to GIRFEC here. Pathfinders etc]
The task groups examined a range of delivery models including family centres and multi-agency approaches. The conclusion was that there is no single model that can be applied to meet the needs of children, families and communities across Scotland due to the diversity of geography and social circumstances that exist.
There may well be a role for a greater number of family centres, but the majority of the improvement in outcomes is likely to come from enhancing family and community capacity alongside building the capability of mainstream services to meet additional needs.
All local authority areas already have a childcare partnership. The services task group supported the partnership approach, but recommended that they be given a more strategic role and become early years and family support partnerships, fully integrated within community planning structures.
More effective partnerships
The private and voluntary sectors are major providers of early years services, accounting for nearly 30% of pre-school provision, an even larger share of childcare provision and a wide variety of supports and services for parents and children with higher needs.
The existing partnership model has brought diversity of provision and made use of many of the particular skills and qualities that the private and voluntary sectors bring to early years. There is a widespread feeling, however, that in many areas we have been left with a patchwork of services that reflects organic growth rather than a strategic approach, and that the nature of partnership will need to evolve if we are to collectively meet the challenges set by this framework.
There are several difficult issues to resolve in moving this forward, but the key areas are around developing more strategic partnerships, developing models of joint delivery involving public and private/voluntary providers, establishing long-term funding arrangements and funding that reflects the real cost of delivering high quality services.
[Ref forthcoming Workforce response to better health better care which apparently has some relevance here]
[Capacity of small voluntary sector providers to support this agenda]
Performance management and accountability
[Link to GIRFEC/Edinburgh University work on indicators]
In order to measure progress, local partners will need to establish a baseline from which movements in outcomes and indicators can be measured. As part of this, it would be good practice to conduct an audit of how each part of the system is contributing to outcomes and the national priorities and what adjustments need to be made to maximise that contribution.
[Something about measuring the contribution of adult services to outcomes for children?]
6. ACTION PLAN
[DN: Cabinet Secretary wants these presented in a away that provides a more direct connection to real people]
Creating the Conditions for Change: National Actions
The following actions all have significant elements that need to be pursued at a national level, although they will be taken forward with the full engagement of local partners.
Overarching
• The Scottish Government will give all aspects of childhood, parenting and family life a high profile and status in political and policy terms, and work with local partners to develop consistent messages. We will look for opportunities to celebrate the contribution of children, parents and families and will not demonise children or parents who face greater challenges
• The Scottish Government will use social marketing tools to promote the value of parenting, childhood and families. This will be reflected in public information work by bodies such as NHS Health Scotland.
• The Scottish Government and COSLA will jointly commission modelling of early years outcomes to help link together evidence, policy, delivery and outcomes
Parenting
• The Scottish Government and its partners will lead a programme promoting a culture of positive parenting and helping prospective parents understand the responsibilities they are taking on and the skills they will need
• Building on the Hallam review of evidence on effective parenting interventions [check title] the Scottish Government will work with partners to reach a common understanding of the most effective early years interventions
Communities
• [The Scottish Government, in partnership with Inspiring Scotland, will launch a venture philanthropy fund to support play]
• The Scottish Government, in partnership with the Care Commission [and others?] will lead a debate on understanding risk
• Over time, the Scottish Government and partners need to increase the emphasis on the role adult services can play in securing positive outcomes for children through GIRFEC.
• HMIe will publish a review of what works in community learning and development to support positive outcomes in early years
Services
• The Scottish Government will continue to develop the national components of Curriculum for Excellence to support local delivery
• [Last step in 50% pre-school commitment]
• The Scottish Government will promote the benefits of a single, accessible and progressive means of supporting parents with the costs of childcare and will seek the powers and funding needed to do so
Workforce
• The Scottish Government will develop a Common Values Statement, starting from the GIRFEC values and principles, involving a wide range of interested partners.
• The Scottish Government will work with a range of partners to embed the values within initial training, induction, CPD, professional standards and service culture.
• The Scottish Government will study the characteristics of successful workforce models in other countries. This will help us shape a long term workforce development options in Scotland. [NB: Doesn’t use the work pedagogue]
• The Scottish Government will commission an analysis of skills and skills gaps across the different professions in early years, as the first in a series of research and analysis projects.
• The Scottish Government will build on developments such as the Continuous Learning Framework in social services and essential shared capabilities which have been developed for the health and social care workforce
• The Scottish Government will use the Common Values Statement and the analysis of skills and gaps to identify core skills needed to deliver the early years framework and Getting it Right for Every Child. This will be used as the basis for engagement with employers to ensure they have plans in place to equip workers with those skills, particularly those with least access to resources and opportunities at present.
• NHS Education Scotland (NES) will take forward new educational developments for roles in the children and young people’s workforce at SCQF levels 7 and 8. The Scottish Government and the Scottish Social Services Council will work with NES to ensure that, over time, we can develop joint roles across health, education and social services. This will enhance accessibility and flexibility of services as well as providing enhanced career opportunities for the workforce
Delivery
• The Scottish Government will support Community Planning Partners to put this framework into action through the 2009-10 Single Outcome Agreements
Local action
Local partners will have a role in both supporting the national priorities and delivering improvement.
There are some aspects of local action that are core to making progress at a national level. There is an expectation that every Community Planning Partnership will be able to demonstrate progress against these core elements.
Core elements
• A local plan for giving all children the best possible start in life based on a whole system approach, building on the existing requirement for Integrated Children’s Services Plans. The text box below gives an example of such a plan from the Bodo municipality in Norway.
• Progress towards universal availability of programmes to build parenting capacity through evidence-based methods, ideally delivered through universal services
• Delivering play opportunities in every community through greenspace and play policies
• More people getting the right support from the outset without the need for referrals through strengthening the capacity of universal services [Set out priorities within this?]
• A more coherent set of supports for children and parents through simplifying and streamlining joint delivery of early years services, with a particular emphasis on 0-3 services [link to GIRFEC]
• Access to integrated pre-school and childcare services in every community matched to an assessment of local demand. A clear view of how private and voluntary sector providers and childminders can play a role in this
• Services working alongside people rather than doing things to them
• Aligning partnership arrangements with outcomes and creating longer term and more strategic partnerships
Key Ingredients
Beyond the Core Elements, the priorities lead to a number of other key ingredients that local partners will want to draw on in developing their single outcome agreements from 2009-10 onwards. The mix of ingredients will be different in each area depending on local circumstances.
A strategic approach
• A strategic early years and family support partnership fully embedded within community planning structures
• An audit of how well local programmes are contributing to outcomes and the vision as part of the process of developing a baseline from which to plan for the future and measure progress.
Parents
• Sexual health advice and services integrated into services for high risk groups such as substance misusers and looked after children. Accessible drop-in sexual health services for teenagers
• A strong emphasis on programme fidelity and appropriate workforce skills for delivering structured parenting programmes
• Developing the role of all pre-school, school, childcare and health services centres in supporting family and community learning. All those engaging with children and families promoting learning in the home and able to identify adult learning needs.
• Enhancing opportunities for parents to get involved in services as volunteer helpers or similar roles.
Communities
• Opportunities for local communities to determine their own aspirations, needs and priorities. Progress measurement should incorporate the perspectives of children and communities
• Promoting positive environments for children and families through planning, regeneration and transport policies
• Developing mutual support networks for grandparents and other informal carers. Considering how they can be given appropriate access to services that support parents
Services
• Continuity of support from pre-conception through to school, encompassing health (including mental health), education, childcare, play, leisure and culture, as well as adult services that have a significant impact on children.
• Establishing a clear core universal set of early years services and entitlements for the local area that delivers a capacity- and resilience-building programme for every child and family, paying attention to the specific areas identified by parents and the task groups [ref the model in the parenting task group report as a starting point?]
• A focus on reaching groups with higher needs and reducing inequalities within local performance management and accountability arrangements
• Through Curriculum for Excellence delivering a mix of academic skills, skills for work, sex education, parenting skills and broader life skills matched to individual needs that will equip all young people to make positive choices about pregnancy and parenthood
• All nurseries and schools supporting outdoor learning and outdoor play. Trying out innovative approaches such as nature kindergartens.
• More consistent access to intensive family support services
• Ensuring adult services such as housing, substance misuse treatment and recognise and promote the needs of children
• Developing a single gateway to a range of advice and information for children and families. Marketing this proactively.
• A clear sense of how interventions will be sustained beyond early years for those who need it
• Developing models of service delivery that combine public sector and partners working alongside each other to common objectives
Workforce
• As national workforce and CPD priorities become established, developing a set of local CPD priorities that support these and which meet local needs
• The development or enhancement of key worker roles
7. RESOURCES
We are setting out high ambitions for early years and early intervention at a time when overall growth in public spending is projected to be modest. Within that context, we cannot rely on large amounts of new money being available to implement the framework.
The scale of the challenge
Expenditure on early years services is already significant. For example, around £200m per annum is spent on pre-school, several hundred million on the early stages of primary, around a further £50m on early intervention for 0-5s, and £30-40m on local support for childcare. [Health numbers for antenatal and post-natal?]. Total spending on early years is therefore of the order of at least £500m and probably closer to £1 Billion per annum [check all this with economists].
Within this context, adding in a few £million here or there is not a realistic means of delivering the ambitions of this framework. Those can only be achieved by a realignment of the existing resource combined with a transfer of resource from crisis intervention into prevention and early intervention.
Creating a virtuous cycle
Over time, we believe that a focus on early years preventative and early intervention services will reduce the need for crisis interventions. We know that crisis interventions are very costly [examples] and that saving even a fraction of those costs could release significant resources for reinvestment in prevention and early intervention. Through such a model, there is the potential to create a virtuous cycle whereby progressively greater savings support increasing investment in early years and early intervention which in turn further reduces the need for crisis intervention.
[pic]
There are significant challenges in creating the virtuous cycle above. The first is the time lag between prevention and early intervention and any measurable difference being seen in demand for crisis intervention services. International research would suggest that the greatest savings come in the long term through reduced dependence on benefits, better employability and reduced crime. Savings in the short term may be much more modest.
The second issue is around realising savings from crisis intervention services. In many areas, demand for such services may exceed supply at present and there may be a strong case for improving the quality of those services as well. We cannot simply write off those who need our support now and therefore reducing the budgets of crisis intervention services be a significant challenge.
[Should we say something about how the framework will feed into future spending reviews?]
[Financial models?]
A realignment towards early intervention services is not simply a case of transferring resources. A reorientation in the philosophy and design of services is needed alongside the transfer of resources to achieve the ambitions of this framework.
Where to start
As noted above, the scale of change in resource allocation that we believe is needed is very significant. There are a few obvious places to start.
By far the biggest elements of current spend are on health services and pre-school and school education. The first priority must be to make these resources support outcomes more effectively. Local partners can start by conducting an audit of how well each element of service delivery is contributing to outcomes, and focusing resources on those that are most closely linked to evidence-based approaches. There are also elements of the local action plan that are deliverable through universal services at relatively modest cost, such as providing a greater focus within existing services on the development of parenting skills, developing broader roles in the workforce and enhancing the role of pre-school and school in family learning.
The review of processes and reduction in overlap and unnecessary bureaucracy being promoted through Getting it Right for Every Child also has the potential to support the proposed transfer of resources, by supporting the above process. A second priority should therefore be to use the learning from the Highland Pathfinder to streamline processes and resources.
[Finally, local authorities and their partners currently spend around £50m per annum on early interventions services for 0-5s, through programmes which are linked to the former Sure Start Scotland programme. These funds support a whole variety of activity. We believe that there is scope in several areas to align this funding much more closely to a small number of priorities which are supported by clear evidence of how they support outcomes. These priorities would be evidence-based parenting support, early entry to centre-based pre-school services and intensive family support services.]
-----------------------
Upbringing/Growing up plan
Bodo was one of 6 pilot areas across Norway take part in the development of upbringing plans for their areas. These were initiated at a central government level with a vision for giving children a better start in life. They were partly funded by the Government for 3 years and Bodø municipality has now decided to continue the project and mainstream the funding. The aim of the project is to ‘follow the children and not the system.’ The project has two parts: one focusing on children 0-12 and one on young people 13-18.
Administratively Bodø has been reorganised so that the Department of Childhood, Adolescence and Culture includes not only the education services that come under the remit of this level of government (kindergartens, primary schools and lower secondary schools), but also health visitors, services for immigrants and refugees and child welfare services. This is to ensure that all sectors, including the voluntary sector, are working together for the benefit of children and young people.
The fundamental principles of the up bringing plan are
• Early intervention – give help and support as early as possible
• Working across sectors – tear down the invisible barriers between the disciplines
• Easy entry – parents easily able to contact the relevant professionals.
• Empowerment – families play an active role in defining their own needs
• Working with parents
The key issue is seen as being to engage hearts and minds in the leadership of the different services, so that they are united in their ambitions for children..
Text box explaining key features of Curriculum for Excellence and Skills for Scotland and how they work together with the early years framework
Relevant National Indicators:
• Increase the proportion of schools receiving positive inspection reports
• Increase the overall proportion of local authority areas receiving positive child protection reports
• Reduce the number of working age people with severe literacy and numeracy problems
• Improve people’s perceptions of the quality of public services delivered
• Decrease the proportions of individuals living in poverty
• 60% of children in primary 1 will have no sign of dental disease by 2010
• Increase the proportion of pre-school centres receiving positive inspection reports
• Improve the quality of healthcare experience
• Reduce the rate of increase in the population of children with a body-mass index outwith the healthy range by 2018
• Reduce the percentage of the adult population who smoke to 22 % by 2010
Early years policy can also support a number of other indicators
The joint policy statement on early years and early intervention, published by the Scottish Government and COSLA on 18 March 2008 [insert link] set out four principles of early intervention which provide a starting point for our model of transformational change across Government and across a range of ages and experiences. The four principles are:
• Our ambitions are universal – we want to reduce inequalities in a variety of policy areas, to have the same outcomes for all and for all to have the same opportunities
• We take action to identify those at risk of not achieving these outcomes or having these opportunities and take action to prevent that risk materialising. Action is not limited to those most at risk but applies to risk at whatever level identified
• We make sustained and effective interventions in cases where these risks have materialised
• We shift the focus from service provision as the vehicle for delivery of outcomes to building the capacity of individuals, families and communities to secure outcomes, and addressing the external barriers which they may face in seeking to maximise their life chances, making use of high quality, accessible public services as required.
Early Years supports at least 12 of the National outcomes:
• Our children have the best start in life and are ready to succeed
• Our young people are successful learners, confident individuals, effective contributors and responsible citizens
• We have improved life chances for children, young people and families at risk
• We realise our full economic potential with more and better employment opportunities for our people
• We are better educated, more skilled and more successful, renowned for our research and innovation
• We live longer, healthier lives
• We have tackled the significant inequalities in Scottish society
• We live our lives safe from crime, disorder and danger
• We have strong, resilient and supportive communities where people take responsibility for their own actions and how they affect others
• We take pride in a strong, fair and inclusive national identity
• Our public services are of high quality, continually improving, efficient and responsive to local people’s needs
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