Children's centres 'do reach neediest families'

In its analysis of Ofsted reports of 37 Sure Start children's centres, 22 centres are providing good outreach services, 12 are providing acceptable services and just four are failing to contact the hard-to-reach families in their area.

Anne Longfield, chief executive of 4Children, said, 'I'm pleased that the first six months of Ofsted reports are reflecting the excellent progress that Sure Start children's centres are making in reaching the most vulnerable families. It is important that myths about middle class families monopolising Sure Start are not used to justify cutting back on the important support they provide to families across the country.'

Last month, Prime Minister David Cameron suggested that Sure Start centres be reserved for disadvantaged families, after claiming that their services are dominated by the middle classes (News, 18 August).

A separate 4Children survey of 1,500 people carried out for the Family Commission also found that one in four families are worried about Sure Start children's services being cut.

4Children will use the findings to support its Shout Out for a Sure Start campaign to urge the Government not to cut funding in next month's spending review.

Home visiting key to success

Palfrey Sure Start Centre in Walsall, West Midlands, has been rated 'outstanding' overall by Ofsted and 'good' for its outreach services.

Many families in the local community are from minority ethnic backgrounds where English is not the first language, and the rate of unemployment and obesity is above the national average.

It provides a range of integrated services, including health, family support, adult training and early years advice and guidance, offered from 23 venues in the area.

In the centre's report in July inspectors praised the centre's outreach workers for successfully using approaches such as home visits and parent and toddler groups to carefully assess users.

The report said, 'The centre has ensured that outreach workers are very well trained to co-ordinate and deliver a range of different services and partnerships to support users. Consequently, users gain great trust in individual outreach workers that enables them to gain confidence and engage successfully in the services.

'The level of engagement of the very large majority of users in this complicated community is impressive. The importance of home visiting to take the services to the families has been instrumental to the centre's success in breaking down barriers of language and isolation.'

Sure Start Palfrey programme manager Mick Davies said that of the 2,500 families registered at the centre, 90 per cent are considered as hard to reach. 'The community would be a poorer place without Sure Start, as research has shown children who attend the centre are more mature and given a better start in life, while parents are empowered with access to training courses and advice.'