Early years isn’t a charity

You know, it has been said that if you stand in the same place for long enough, everything just comes around again. I feel rather like this after more than 30 years of working with children.

There have been a number of different reports and reviews over the past few months about children’s social care; the Sutton Trust and even the outgoing report from the children’s commissioner. They all point to the same thing: a long-term lack of adequate funding for children, especially in early years and early intervention.

I have seen the dismantling of the school system under a previous government in the 1980s, and things feel similar in the present day. An approach based upon business principles that ignores the impact of a market system, applied to social responsibility. It didn’t work then and I don’t see it working now. Value is often defined in terms of profit or savings (or could this be ‘outcomes’) at the expense of wellbeing. The cacophony of information about the poor state of our health, both physical and mental, is plain to see on the mainstream documentaries, as we bulk-eat ready meals and spend our lives literally worrying ourselves sick about social media presence. In a time when everyone needs funding, only the most extreme cases are liable to receive it. To be honest, it feels a bit gloomy.