4Children today published proposals for a groundbreaking package of measures designed to offer support and opportunities for all children, young people and families, with the potential to transform lives and improve outcomes for children living in the most disadvantaged of Britain’s communities.

4Children is calling on Secretary of State for Children, Families and Schools Ed Balls MP to seize the unique opportunity presented by the Department’s forthcoming Children’s Plan to revolutionise and modernise support for children to reflect dramatic changes in modern families.

Original evidence gathered by 4Children demonstrated the need for a new settlement for children and parents to provide a commitment to all parents for support to bring up their children – something that Scandinavian parents have enjoyed for decades.

During 2007 the charity found through consultations of children and parents that:

• Less than a quarter of children and young people feel that they are equal members of their local community to adults
• Over 7 out of 10 young people feel that communities are not designed with their interests in mind
• 92% of young people felt that it was important that their local area offered more places that they could call their own
• Over 9 out of 10 parents consulted felt that their local area did not offer enough by way of services and activities for their children
• 71% of parents say that they do not know where to go to get support or information on parenting if they needed it

The new report, entitled Free Range Childhoods, proposes a package of measures to support all parents, to maximise children’s participation in school and to transform communities into ’child friendly zones’. The report also highlights how improving outcomes for the most vulnerable children means bringing down old barriers to help by creating a system of support which is accessed by more families and looking at ways to support children up to the age of 19.

Proposals give a detailed insight into the type of local area that makes for a good experience of growing up – including good local schools, access to GPs and the state of parks and green spaces. With options limited for many parents by high house prices – particularly those parents who are poor and live in disadvantaged areas with poor facilities and amenities – the report demands a reconfiguration of deprived neighbourhoods around families to improve conditions for children as they grow up.

Building on prominent research into the key pressure points in children’s lives, the report identifies a number of key influences on children as they develop, building a blueprint for Government on how best to support families to outwit disadvantage and the effects of poverty. Measures involve strengthening and supporting the role of parents, doing more to involve and inspire children and creating a step change in opportunities for play and positive contact with other adults in the local public areas.

Published during a time of concern about wellbeing and intense criticism of young people who cause anti-social behaviour and crime, the report calls for an immediate ’rebalancing’ of communities – taking radical steps to build socially excluded children and young people back into their areas through a combination of more and better things to do and places to go, improved outdoor play space and a step change in support from inspirational adults.

Anne Longfield OBE, Chief Executive of 4Children said:
“Every child deserves a happy childhood but for too long we have felt the impact of failing to live up to our responsibility to provide a good childhood for every young person and to provide the support children and families need. The effects of living in struggling families or on troubled and deprived estates can be devastating to the life chances of a child, whether that child is in the early years or a teenager – creating a poverty both of means and of aspiration that dampens ambitions and creates intergenerational cycles of harm.

”Government interventions have made improvements but their complexity and lack of coordination undermines their important contribution and limits their effect. What is needed is a new frontier of the welfare state to offer children and families the commitment and assurance they need that their children are valued and important and that support will be there to help bring up children when needed.”

View the full report here.

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