• 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review
• Every Parent Matters
  • Parenting Support - a booklet with guidance on how schools can get involved
• DfES Five Year Strategy for Children and Learners
• Parents as partners in early learning - visit www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/
• Family programmes - guidance - family learning and family literacy, language and numeracy
• Every Child Matters
• Extended schools
• On Track - working with families to prevent crime
• Skills for Families

Key priorities for parenting provision in 2006

Overview of Government approaches

Support for families is a strong feature of current government policy to address social exclusion. Every Parent Matters provides findings from research and practice about work with parents and the effects of this on children’s outcomes, with a summary of recent Government action and action to be taken in the near future. The 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review commissioned a policy review of support for children and families, to inform spending priorities for the years 2008-11.

As part of its policy review, the government published in May 2007 its objectives in family policy, which are: to support families to exercise their rights to manage their own affairs while living up to the responsibilities they have; to enable a work-family balance, by helping people move from welfare to work, improving childcare and supporting family commitments; and to address the hardest to reach families, by tackling the causes and consequences of deep-seated social exclusion.

Sure Start local programmes target families in disadvantaged areas to help parents develop good early language and communication skills in their very young children. There was an expansion of family literacy, language and numeracy programmes (sometimes called FLLN), as a strand within the Skills for Life national strategy and coordinated by the Learning and Skills Council (LSC).

The sum of £23.1 million was made available to the LSC for these programmes in 2002-03 and again in 2004-05, with the aim of reaching 100,000 family learners in each of the two years - much of it targeted on the most deprived local authorities (LAs) in England. A small amount of money is also available for wider family learning programmes, which can help to build child and parental confidence, and to support the appointment of LA-wide family learning coordinators. These coordinators can facilitate the link into family literacy provision and provide parents with opportunities to progress onto accredited courses. Guidance on family programmes

Other government initiatives that provide a range of services to families and communities in deprived areas would benefit from a greater literacy focus, including children's centres, extended schools and neighbourhood renewal initiatives. Families at risk who receive targeted support through the Children's Fund and On Track might also benefit from literacy support.

1. Increasing provision of effective, evidence-based support that:

• Reaches fathers as well as mothers
• Is culturally sensitive
• Is persistent in ensuring those least likely to ask for advice, but most likely to need it, get appropriate support
• Combines the practical and the therapeutic: eg employment advice as well as managing behaviour

2. Balancing support with challenge

(These priorities were set out by Naomi Eisenstadt, Chief Adviser on Children and Young People's Services, at a seminar entitled Parenting and 21st Century Families, July 2006, London: Demos.)