Interview: Andrea Leadsom MP and Jo Churchill, public health minister

The PM has asked Andrea Leadsom to lead the Early Years Healthy Development Review. In January, it will produce a new vision ‘for what excellence looks like’ in support for the period from conception to age two. The aim is for better joined-up services focusing on the needs of babies and their families.

WHAT DOES THE REVIEW INVOLVE AND HOW DID IT COME ABOUT?

Andrea Leadsom: The review focuses on the period from conception to age two and the support given to families, with a specific focus on the baby. Work began in July and Phase One will be published in January, with recommendations and a vision for what excellence looks like in the first 1,001 days.

We have talked to families and health professionals; we have done virtual visits to Devon and Camden Children’s Centres to see services that have stayed open or gone virtual; we’ve seen rural outreach and urban city-based service support. Our online questionnaire received 3,600 replies and we are getting hundreds of responses from a Mumsnet questionnaire thread.

Three advisory groups sit on the review: parliamentary, professional and academic. There has been huge engagement. Because of the pandemic, people are focused on whether things have worked well or badly for them. But this review pre-dates the pandemic. It’s a follow-on from an inter-ministerial group that I chaired in 2018 to 2019.

Jo Churchill: This review puts babies at the heart of the policies being driven forward, and by supporting the people who bring them into the world, it makes sure every baby gets the best start in life. It can only really be achieved when services join together, and Andrea has been pulling the different strands together to make this happen. I’m really excited about January. It’s a new year, and making sure every baby has the best start in life can’t be a bad ambition for 2021.

MANY BABIES AND PARENTS HAVE BEEN ADVERSELY AFFECTED BY THE PANDEMIC. HOW WILL THE REVIEW ADDRESS THIS?

AL: Covid has shone a spotlight on the issues we’re dealing with in the review. Lots of parents have really suffered from not being able to meet with other new parents, and some have been terribly isolated. Anecdotally, it does seem that some newborns found it quite traumatic when they were able to meet other babies, adults and extended family for the first time this summer, after being born in lockdown. They were upset to hear all the noise, and it makes you wonder if this has had a fundamental impact on them.

A lot of early years services – Children’s Centres and midwives and health visitors – moved heaven and earth to continue to provide support. And although we’ve seen a lot about the awfulness of parents not being able to be together, for scans and other milestones, there is another side to this. We’ve discovered the reality of virtual meetings. A lot of the feedback from parents is they have found it helpful to be able to text their health visitor or have a virtual meeting with the GP. And not to have to get dressed or go on the bus or load up the car with a new baby in tow.

But professionals have also reported that they’ve found it easier to share their data and provide better joined-up support for families because they can meet virtually, rather than having to align diaries and wait days, only to have someone cancel at the last minute.

WHAT ABOUT THE ABSENCE OF FACE-TO-FACE SERVICES DURING THE PANDEMIC?

JC: With Covid, we’ve been almost thrown into a real-time experiment and it’s important to make note of some of the positives. This does not in any way downplay the negatives. It has been tough – and for lots of people. Before we went into the pandemic, about 3 per cent of general practices could do virtual meetings. Now, it’s 99 per cent. So, for a mum who struggles with public transport and other things, there are accessibility positives.

A speech and language therapist recently told me how she has been able to work with a mum online when she’s feeding her baby who struggled to latch on due to being tongue-tied. For any mum who is struggling with these things, there have been some positives.

WILL LOCAL AUTHORITIES HAVE THE RESOURCES THEY NEED TO FUND TARGETED AND SPECIALIST SERVICES?

AL: The review will be making its recommendations in January. I can’t tell you how much extra money will be available, but I can say there are some real wins from better joined -up services. For example, data-sharing will enable professionals to provide much more focused support on what families need and less time will be spent for parents retelling their story to different professionals.

Being able to ask questions online not only saves the parent what could be a difficult journey, but it also saves the health visitor or the GP a significant amount of time over a home visit. Digital can’t replace face-to-face, but it can significantly add to it. We’re looking at much better shared data and record-keeping, and the digital red book is potentially a key part of that.

There are a lot of services available between conception to the age of two, and it is definitely my view, from all that I’ve heard, that better join-up will enable us to do so much more without that much more money, but a much better focus.

WHAT IS THE KEY MESSAGE FOR NURSERY WORLD READERS, WHO LOOK TOWARDS A BRIGHTER FUTURE FOR NEW BABIES, THROUGHOUT THE PANDEMIC AND BEYOND?

AL: I really believe we have an opportunity to profoundly change the support provided to families in that critical 1,001-day period, for the better. And it’s so important, because if you get families with a new baby off to a great start, where the parents feel confident and supported, they in turn will be able to handle the challenges of having a new baby and will provide the baby with all of the inputs it needs to develop its own emotional and physical resilience. So, it’s a virtuous circle that I feel this work is absolutely pivotal to improving the outcomes for our whole society.

Andrea Leadsom is MP for South Northamptonshire. She was leader of the House of Commons from 2017- 19 and was appointed Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy in 2019. She left the Government in February. Jo Churchill is Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Prevention, Public Health and Primary Care at the Department of Health and Social Care.

The call for evidence for Phase One has closed, but the Early Years Healthy Development Review Team would still like to hear your views at: earlyyearsreview@dhsc.gov.uk