Reports

This report suggests that Family Hubs should be part of our efforts to improve prospects for current generations of children and young people. Their strength lies in their holistic approach to support: providing a one-stop source of information and services for parents and their children, from the earliest years.

“Family Hubs Network was pleased to see that every party has considered families in their manifestos. We are excited to see what policies the next Government will implement to build on support already given to families, and hope this report will clarify what each party is promising.”

“Our polling shows many families are struggling not just with the cost of living but with our tax system which takes away too much hard-earned cash from them if there is only one earner, or the other partner earns very little. Current child benefit rules are especially punitive to many such families. Anomalies like this have been repeatedly highlighted and there is now strong public appetite for reform which the Government must ignore no longer.” Dr Samantha Callan OBE, FHN Director

Family hubs transformation funding is being used by 75 local authorities (LAs) to open family hubs in 2023 with an expectation that they will be fully functional by the end of 2024-25, with a further 13 LAs having received transformation funding in 2021. However, services such as those offered by family hubs are only effective when people engage with them, and the most disadvantaged and vulnerable families are those least likely to engage. This work programme looks at ways to address the barriers and facilitators to uptake or engagement with family hubs services by families, especially those who are disadvantaged or vulnerable.

To improve children’s outcomes in the early years of life, it’s important that the people in your workforce have the skills and capacity to provide effective wraparound support to children and their families. As a whole the workforce needs to be well integrated and multi-skilled. The best start for life: a vision for the 1,001 critical days prioritises ‘developing a modern, skilled workforce to meet the changing needs of families’. The practical guidance in this resource will support you to act on this priority. The guidance is based on the premise that integrated services and interprofessional working are the most effective and efficient ways of providing services for families – especially those from disadvantaged or marginalised backgrounds. To achieve this, we need to attend to the ‘fragmentation’ and ‘silos’ that hamper the delivery of services for children and families at a local level

Every local area has services and interventions that support babies, children, young people and their families. They include everything from the first services that parents (or expectant parents) turn to when they are struggling with an issue, to targeted support that focuses on specific needs.