Tameside to benefit from £500M family programme

Families in Tameside will soon benefit from a new service set to give support to parents and young children, the Government has announced.

Best Start Family Hubs are set to be introduced to every authority in England by 2028, at the cost of £500 million. 

The project plans to build on existing family services in local areas to provide a single point of access for health, education and wellbeing. They will also allow parents to access additional maternity services and receive support for wider issues, such as stopping smoking or substance abuse. 

Education secretary Bridget Phillipson said she hoped the plans would provide a “lifeline of consistent support across the nation, ensuring health, social care and education work in unison to ensure all children get the very best start in life”.

The project works to restore 1,000 of the 1,400 Sure Start centres have been shuttered since 2010, and comes after the Conservative government opened 75 hubs across England last year. 

Shadow education secretary Laura Trott was critical of the announcement, and warned it “brings little clarity on what’s genuinely new and what simply rebrands existing services”.

“That lack of clarity is part of a wider pattern," she said. "This is a government defined by broken promises and endless U-turns.”

Speaking on the announcement, Bridget Phillipson said: “It’s the driving mission of this government to break the link between a child’s background and what they go on to achieve – our new Best Start Family Hubs will put the first building blocks of better life chances in place for more children.

“Making sure hard-working parents are able to benefit from more early help is a promise made, and promise kept – delivering a lifeline of consistent support across the nation, ensuring health, social care and education work in unison to ensure all children get the very best start in life.”