Society pays later for not giving vulnerable children a good start | Letters

A wealth of research shows early intervention has significant benefits, says Peter Toolan while Paul Bywaters says cuts to Sure Start have been accompanied by a destructive focus on parenting skills

Frank Field (Letters, 28 September and 5 October) and Sebastian Kraemer (Letters, 3 October) are right to highlight the £750m cut to services to support vulnerable families. This is indeed a national disgrace, but has gone under the wire partly due to Brexit.

Home-Start and Sure Start were truly progressive initiatives, now thoroughly undermined by these cuts. In 2011, Graham Allen and Iain Duncan Smith published a cross-party governmental report, Early Intervention: Smart Investment, Massive Savings.

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from Children | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2y5D22v