During the first evidence session of a rebooted inquiry into the first 1,000 days of life this week, Labour members of the Health and Social Care Committee repeatedly sought to pinpoint Leadsom’s stance on austerity-related defunding of the Blairite government’s flagship policy.
The programme has in recent years been shown to have led to positive health and education outcomes for children who lived near centres that opened between 1999 and 2003 in highly disadvantaged neighbourhoods, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
MP Josh Fenton-Glynn repeatedly asked if she had “regrets” over the closure of more than 1,300 Sure Start centres after the Conservatives took power in 2010 – with just over 2,000 estimated to be remaining last year.
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