The Scottish Government is promising 'a new approach', 'a new conceptualisation' and 'a new level of ambition' for tackling age-old inequalities within Scottish society under its Early Years Framework (EYF), unveiled last month.
The new framework, developed in collaboration with independent experts over the past nine months, sets out the Government's vision for improving the life chances of Scotland's youngest children over the next ten years.
Significantly, the new framework is the first policy initiative devised under the Scottish Government's Concordat with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA), an agreement in which the Government stated its intention to 'stand back from micro-managing' service delivery and 'free up local authorities and their partners to get on with the job'.
The EYF sits alongside a poverty framework, published in late November, and forms a major strand within the new Equally Well health ?initiative.
With it, says the Scottish Government, comes:
- 'a radical shift away from the culture of crisis management to early intervention';
- 'a new emphasis on the crucial birth to three period of a child's life' - the framework covers the interests of children pre-conception to the age of eight;
- a focus on engagement and building greater resilience in families and communities;
- the goal to strengthen universal early years services.
Launching the framework, children's minister Adam Ingram said, 'We know that the early years represent a golden opportunity, when positive action can have the biggest influence on a person's life.
'It's time to end the culture of crisis management that leaves risks to fester and this framework marks a new era with central and local government working together on the big issues facing Scotland.'
Council Commitment
The framework comes with no new money, however. With ring-fencing reduced and local authorities now allowed to retain their efficiency savings under the Concordat, the 'framework can only be taken forward by realigning and prioritising resources to offer more effective support to all families.'
Martin Crewe, director of Barnardo's Scotland and a team member in developing the EYF, doubts that new money would offer a lasting solution. 'We're very supportive of the framework, as it recognises the key importance of the early years and early intervention.
'The total early years spend in Scotland this year was £1.5bn. To make a major improvement would need hundreds of millions of pounds. But we're in this for the long term and it's far better to look at redistributing money within the system.'
The framework has also been welcomed by Angus Council, which already has a strong focus on early intervention. Gillian Strachan, principal officer of the School and Family Support Service at Angus council, says, 'It will raise the importance of engaging with families in the early stages and the importance of local authorities putting funding and planning into the early years and prevention rather than crises management later in the child's life.'
As for delivering change on current funding, she says, 'Angus council demonstrates a commitment and investment in working with children and families. Although we have the same constraints as other councils, it's this commitment from the local authority that makes the difference.'
Carrot and stick
The fact that the framework is presented as a set of aspirations and comes with no financial carrot or stick raises questions over whether all local authorities will bring about the 'transformational change' in services the Government seeks.
Martin Crewe is cheered by the level of debate the document has already provoked. 'What's encouraging,' he says, 'is that plans are being made that go across the different sectors and there's a good sense that people are working with the document. We want to work alongside our colleagues in the statutory sectors as they face up to the difficult decisions to be taken at a local level.'
Bronwen Cohen, chief executive of Children in Scotland and a member of the programme board responsible for overseeing the development of the EYF, argues for a greater continuing role for Government: in supporting workforce development, in encouraging the development of new models for services, and in monitoring the implementation of the EYF. She says this is a matter for Government, not COSLA.
A longstanding critic of early years policies in Scotland, she says, 'Good intentions abound but are not always followed up. For example, a 2001 Audit Scotland report recommendation that councils should integrate their pre-school education with childcare was never monitored, and many working parents still find themselves unable to use the local authority service because of their limited hours.'
Progress will inevitably vary, says Alice Sharp, managing director of training provider Experiential Play. 'The framework is exciting and has come at the right time, but every local authority and every unit within early years services has a different level of understanding and commitment, and much will depend on the vision that each takes from the document.'
Equally Well
The four priorities in the Equally Well - Implementation Plan are:
- children's very early years;
- cardiovascular disease and cancer;
- drug and alcohol problems and links to violence;
- mental health and wellbeing.
Within early years, the Plan covers:
- The Early Years Framework;
- A Nurse Family Partnership pilot in NHS Lothian, which will provide holistic support services for families with very young children at risk of poor health and other poor outcomes (to start in 2009);
- A two-year project to increase health and well-being support in schools (started autumn 2008);
- The Road to Recovery drugs strategy, which has 17 actions to improve support for children and young people affected by parental substance misuse (published May 2008).
As with the EYF, the focus is on moving away from 'providing services (doing things for or to people) to building the capacity of individuals, families and communities' and 'addressing the external barriers' to accessing services.
More Information
- Achieving Our Potential: A framework to tackle poverty and income inequality in Scotland (November 2008);
- Equally Well - Report of the ministerial task force on health inequalities (June 2008);
- Equally Well - Implementation plan (December 2008);
- The Early Years Framework (December 2008);
- All are available at www.scotland.gov.uk
Model of Good Practice
The EYF cites examples of projects that could become models of good practice in Scotland, among them Angus council's School and Family Support Service.
The service comprises an early years team and a team of social workers, community learning and development workers, and a mental health nurse. Their work has brought about improvements in children's behaviour, in families' parenting skills and in parents' engagement with their children's learning.
The council uses a solution-focused approach, which builds on the positive aspects of existing behaviour, rather than focusing on the negative.
'This approach engages parents in a more positive way and helps support parents to support their own children,' says Gillian Strachan, the service's Principal Officer.
'Engagement and empowerment of parents may be seen by some local authorities as threatening. However, in Angus the aim is to support parents to work in partnership, and bring about positive and lasting change in parenting and children's learning. Feedback from parents indicate they welcome opportunities to develop their parenting skills.'
The early years workforce has also supported the protection of vulnerable children through early intervention plans and joint working with partners including police, health, social work and the voluntary sector.
Part of this work has included circle time in schools, which helps tackle social inclusion by 'helping the other children to be more tolerant and empathetic towards the more vulnerable children,' says Mrs Strachan.
Angus is also running a pilot in which there is a member of staff from the School and Family Support Service in each sector of a local area - early years, primary and secondary. The aim is to provide more in-depth work with parents in the home, earlier prevention of child protection cases, more regular contact with vulnerable younger children and their families, quicker solutions to anti-social behaviour and follow through of continuous support from ages three to 18.
