The failure of health services to share birth data with children’s centres, fragmented commissioning by agencies and a lack of shared vision across the early years, can mean that families are missing out on support, the Early Intervention Foundation report says.
It calls for local areas to work together to undertake an integrated review of two-year-olds, consider the role of children’s centres as part of an integrated 0-5 system and provide families needing extra help with a named worker who can co-ordinate services.
It also recommends the appointment of a national figurehead to lead on integration across the workforce and develop plans for an integrated inspection framework to bring together the work of Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission.
The report also highlights good practice examples through the work of 20 EIF Pioneering Places, which the EIF has been working with.
Getting it right for families – a review of integrated systems and promising practice in early years, includes cases studies on 20 projects across the country bringing together health and education services - health visitors, midwives and GPs with children’s centres, nurseries and childcare.
While ‘high-quality public services have the potential to reduce the stress that vulnerable families experience…there is no doubt that inflexible or difficult to access services inevitably increase the stress many families experience or lead to missed opportunities to support children’s development.’
The report’s publication coincides with that of a joint study commissioned by the Department for Education and the Department of Health into the work of nurseries and children’s centres in five areas piloting the integrated two-year-old check.
Carey Oppenheim, chief executive of the EIF, said,‘We are pleased to see the strong encouragement from Government today for health and early years checks at age two to be integrated throughout the country. Bringing health and education perspectives together to create a rounded picture of child development at this crucial stage is vitally important.
‘The early years are a key period in a child’s development. The fragmented way we organise services for children from conception to five means vital needs are missed and opportunities lost. By integrating services around the young child and the family we can provide the right level of expertise to the right families at the right time.’
Donna Molloy, head of implementation at the EIF and one of the report’s authors, said, ‘The promising practice highlighted in this report needs to become the norm not the exception. Integration really matters because it is about services that are organised to suit families not the professionals that run them.’
Health minister Dr Dan Poulter said, ‘We welcome the Early Intervention Foundation’s report and their work to show how integration can lead to improved services for young children and families, designed around the needs of the child.’
The 20 EIF pioneering places in the report are: Blackburn with Darwen, Blackpool, Cheshire West and Chester, Croydon, Doreset, Essex, Gateshead, Greater Manchester, Hertfordhsire, Islington, Lancashire Police and Crime Commissioner, Newcastle, Nottingham City, Plymouth, Poole, Solihull, Staffordshire Police and Crime Commissioners, Swindon and Wiltshire, London Tri Borough – Hammersmith & Fulham, Kensington & Chelsea, and Westminster, Worcestershire.
