Building Back Better. Reaching England’s Left Behind Children.
This was an opportunity for Anne Longfield to review her six years as Children’s Commissioner. It began with a recording of children and young people expressing their views. This was important because Anne Longford has long demanded that children and young people be heard.
What Anne Longfield is keen to achieve is that when we finally emerge fro the Covid Crisis the views and needs of children and young people are heard, recognised and acted upon. What the Covid crisis has done is to draw into much sharpen relief the issues which have been affecting children and young people in the years preceding Covid but have to a large extent been ignored. Put simply, every child has the right to a good home, a good education and a successful life. The provisions needed to provide this are quite simple.
Anne Longfield reveals how much she has learnt from children and young people, she has found that they have been willing to talk to her and express their views. One thing that she found when she started on this role as Children’s Commissioner was a lack of data and she has made one of her chief objectives to obtain the data, recognising that she needed to accumulate data from a wide range of fields. She has found that those people who are making decisions about children and young people in actual fact know so little about those young people. Her major concern has been about the children and young people who are falling through the gaps which arise because areas of concerns and of policy are not joined up within an overall strategy.
What she has found is that the problems that young people face are wide ranging. A major issue is that of mental health, an area in which provision for young people is clearly inadequate (far more is spent on adult mental health provision than on that for children and young people). During the Covid crisis, an added factor has been the question of loneliness, children not being able to meet up with their friends, to socialise and enjoy the company of their friends. Other factors such as abuse of children has also increased during Covid. A desire expressed by many children is that they just want to feel like other children, be supported, be normal. There is a sense that adults are letting down the children they should be supporting.
A problem that Anne Longfield highlights is that the machinery of Government means that those responsible for children’s lives do not get to meet them. Too often those in charge of the system do not see and understand the lives of the children for who they are legislating. She refers to the fact that one in five children do not reach the required levels after all there years of schooling. She notes the different issues such as children in poverty, those in special needs, and those that are involved with social services, but then goes on to show how all of these are interlinked, with children and young people facing multiple issues and overlapping vulnerabilities. Of those children who are not succeeding 3 out of 4 have one or more of these problems.
However, Anne Longfield wants us to look beyond the headlines. Thanks in good part to the work that she has done, we have the data to guide our thoughts and actions. She comes back to the basic need, if we are to do something about the needs of children we have to alleviate poverty. She asks, of us all, are we serious about children and their life chances? Do you understand the situation?Will you put children at need as a priority? The reality is that we have the highest level of child poverty since the 1960’s. She refers to the need for Universal credit for families. The position in which families find themselves in has a particularly high effect upon the child’s future. Se has a message for the Prime Minister, when he talks of ‘levelling up’ he needs to give a clear priority to their lives. We must get beyond the pigeon hole concept and develop integrated policies which link all aspects of the lives of families and of children within the family.
She notes how different are the lives of children who live in families with a degree of affluence compared to those whose surroundings do not have such benefits. In policy making we need to concentrate upon children and their needs, to look at new opportunities and to look for what can be done. She is concerned about the institutional approach and the use of techniques such as cost benefit analysis which discriminate against families and children. Throughout, she has a belief that the issues which she is dealing with involve both family and child. Her approach is a multi-disciplinary approach, seeing a cumulative effect of spending policy, investment in one area can lead to benefits in other areas. There appears to be an institutional bias against children. Family circumstances determines children’s life chances.
She is concerned that the bureaucracy of Government must understand this. It is a question of priorities. She expressed her concern that she had to cajole people in Government to listen to the data that she obtain, and that sadly, after hearing they went back to their old ways. Society has a moral imperative to help families help children.
There is a desperate need to build back Better. Her proposal is that we should launch a year of opportunity for children and young people. This would involve the schools; it would involve forging the aims and interests of young people; it would go beyond conventional school life to involve sports, art galleries, libraries, communal activities, indeed every aspect of life. Children and young people would be given priority and their ideas and opinions, wishes and desires would be at the centre of everything that is done. We need to be passionate about children. We should define ourselves by what we offer to children. She called for a national effort, led by the Prime Minister, to reboot childhood. We need a Covid Covenant to Children.
She closed with the plea: children are being failed by the system: Please do not forget about them. These are your children. You can put the first and build around them.
Robert Halfon, MP , Chair of the Parliamentary Education Committee, began by outlining the many problem that children and young people face during the Covid crisis, in particular dealing with the school, or lack of it, situation and the role of technology. He expressed concern about the mental health of pupils and with the widening gap between those that are doing well at school, mainly from the lore affluent families, and those that are falling behind. He sets out various factors which indicate progress ad calls for a radical, rather than revolutionary change. He places strong emphasis on family hubs. He presents a lot of statistics but notes the need for money for front line services and for health visits. He noes the need for remedial action for those with grim prospects, recognising the need to assess the extent of lot learning and the providing an extension of small group tutoring.
He refers to the fact that one third of primary school children are over weight and suggests a remedy in an extended school day to provide for physical activities, suggesting that school sports improves mental health. Other suggestions that he makes are to use existing schemes such as the Pupil Premium and to boost the quality of teaching in deprived areas through such means as salary bonuses. He speaks of a ‘ladder of opportunity for all children’ and suggests moving away from statistics approach to show outcomes.
Louise Carey, who has spent mush of her life working with the homeless, began her contribution by referring to the the problem of poverty, noting that Government spending was now back to the levels seen in 1990. She expressed her concerns over the £20 uplift over which there is much controversy. The question of austerity and its effects on children and vulnerable groups were upper most in her mind. She contrasted this with the public service sector which had stood up despite austerity. We can do something differently but noted the fact that although we are all in the same storm, some are in boats and managing to sail through the storm, but others are on rafs which are liable to sink. She dismissed the possibility of ‘getting back to normal’. Even before the present crisis, the cracks in the system were clearly to be seen, but the Covid crisis has widened those cracks to chasms. This crisis will not be over soon. She looked at the numbers: nearly six million on Universal credit; two million on legacy benefit; four million on furlough (turning to food banks and food relief in Britain in 2021!) three million small business people and the likes who are excluded: this amounts to between 18 and 25% of the population not counting those on zero hour contracts or minimum income.
As we go forward we must go forward together. We need to make sure hat everybody pulls through. No child or family should be left behind. We have not faced such a situation since the end of world war two. We need to think big, it is not enough for the Government to be defensive and do a bit. We ned to decide what kind of society do we want.
We need to avoid the danger of opposing child to family. We have to realise that if a child is found to be in need, we have to look at what is happening in the family. Also, if there are problems within the family, such as abuse and violence, we have to examine the effect of this upon the child. The problem is not isolated to one side, family or child, but problems interact upon both family and child. It is far better to prevent problems arising that to have later to find a solution to problems that have got out of hand.
Louisa Casey shows that the public is on our side. She draws on the wealth of information provided by the actions of people during the Covid crisis: 74% support the uplift in universal credit, the support for food banks, and the desire for a fair and equitable society. We know what needs to be done – we need to go ahead and do it. The legacy of the pandemic is a driving obsession to deal with people affected by poverty and discrimination. We must put the vulnerable people first with children and young people at the top of the list.
Conclusions
I have tried to give a correct report of this meeting, based on my notes taken during the meeting. They are therefore to some extent subjective, but I hope I have reflected the main issues of concern for each of the speakers, There followed after this four groups of questions on different aspects of the subject. The questions were posed by children and young people and answered, according to their specialisation, by the three speakers.
I have my own views on how children and young people are treated, especially in my area of expertise in education. There are issues that have been raised to which I could respond. I am fully aware of the wealth of detailed information and proposals that have come from the Children’s Commission under the leadership of Anne Longfield. I am also aware of the fact that much of this information and these proposals have been ignored. I was not aware of the work done by Louisa Casey but found her passionate advocacy extremely powerful. Having been an advisor to Government on homelessness, she must feel that much of her advice has been ignored. As far as Richard Halfon is concerned, I can only accept the view of the other two speakers as to the value of his work with regards to Education and young people. However, some of the statements he made I found to be unhelpful. The concept of extending the school day to provide greater opportunities for sport and other activities is not high on my list of educational reforms. Nor am I happy with paying higher salaries to tempt teachers to move into deprived areas. I am certainly not in favour of an academic levy to take a few working class children to study in public schools.
I find a sharp distinction between the views so powerfully put forward by Anne Longfield and Louisa Casey and the whole philosophy held by the Government of Boris Johnson, and sadly imitated by the Labour Party under Keir Starmer. Despite his individual qualities, Robert Halfon is part of the Government party. If we are to emerge from the Covid crisis with a radical new approach to how we treat children, the Anne and Louisa had demonstrated beyond doubt that we have to change our social problems, in terms of working situations, housing, income and education, culture and sport. In other words, radical change is not enough. What is needed is a complete revolution in how we think, and how we organise society. It is my view, that with regard to children and young people, we should have a totally different approach. Children and young people do not belong to their parents, they are not a form of property, nor do they belong to society, they are individuals with their own rights, expectations and should be involved in all decisions affecting them. What we do have is a responsibility not only for all children and young people, bit for all our fellow citizens, but especially those who have special and particular needs. Many, if not all of these needs are created by defects in our society which we need to correct.
Scribart 17.2.21
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