Government announces two hundred million pound joint working fund

The move, just one of the measures announced as part of the government's The Children's Plan: One Year On strategy, is intended to help professionals who work with children and young people communicate more easily.

Children's Secretary Ed Balls also announced £31m to help children with special educational needs achieve their potential, £41m to support low performing schools as part of the National Challenge and £1.5m to set up a new employer taskforce.

The taskforce will be led by senior business people and employers, who will work to provide business enterprise education and improve literacy and numeracy in primary schools.

A new strategy, Building Stronger Partnerships, will also encourage joint working between employers and schools.

Balls claimed that the The Children's Plan is "not just about the government churning out policy papers" and promised sustained investment for the children and young people's workforce in 2009.

He said: "One year into The Children's Plan and there is much to celebrate and be proud of. But at the same time there are still too many young people not fulfilling their potential, too many schools where standards are not high enough and we can never be satisfied until we have done all we can to protect every child from abuse, harm and neglect."