Giving children a better start in life

The foundations for a happy, healthy life are laid during pregnancy and a child’s first few years. This is why The National Lottery Community Fund set up and funded A Better Start – a 10-year, £215m programme, designed to improve the life chances of babies and young children from pregnancy to four years old. This month, the programme celebrates its fifth birthday and half a decade of National Lottery funding aimed at transforming the lives of thousands of children across England.

Multi-agency partnerships

A Better Start works through five local multi-agency partnerships in Blackpool, Bradford, Lambeth, Nottingham, and Southend that develop and test new approaches to boosting child development in their most deprived wards. It covers three key areas of child development – social and emotional development; speech, language and communication; and diet and nutrition. Each partnership works closely with statutory services, voluntary and community sector organisations, and, most importantly, local families to devise and implement services the area needs. From Southend’s Fathers Reading Every Day scheme to Blackpool’s support services for mothers who experienced childhood trauma, no two partnerships are the same, as illustrated by the examples over the next three pages.