[Relevant documents: First Report of the Petitions Committee, The impact of Covid-19 on maternity and parental leave, HC 526; and the Government response, HC 770.]
I remind hon. Members that there have been some changes to normal practice to support the new call list system and to ensure that social distancing is respected. Hon. Members should sanitise their microphones using the cleansing materials provided before they use them, and dispose of those materials when they leave the room. Hon. Members are also asked to respect the one-way system around the room, so please exit by the door on the left. Apologies if hon. Members are already familiar with this, but for those who are not, we need to do it. Please speak only from the horseshoe. I do not think we have too many hon. Members today, but otherwise people would need to wait. I remind hon. Members to arrive at the start of the debate. I know one hon. Member may need to pull out; please let me know if that is the case.
That this House has considered the future of nurseries and early years settings.
I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this debate, which is a coming together of the all-party parliamentary group for childcare and early education, which I chair and which fights for the private, voluntary and independent sector—PVI—and the APPG on nursery schools, nursery and reception classes, which does good work campaigning for the maintained nursery sector. We will hear shortly from one of its vice-chairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers). The hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) cannot take part today but is also very much involved in that group and was a co-sponsor of the debate.
The two parts of the sector are distinct, but they share the same grave concern about what the future holds. As a constituency MP, I am fortunate to represent both. There is a mature but, it must be said, struggling PVI sector with providers such as Kings Worthy, St Paul’s, Colden Common, and Compton and Shawford to name a few. There are many others. I thank them all for making me properly aware of the sector and its challenges in the first place, alongside my brilliant wife, who is a qualified level 3 practitioner, so I hear it very clearly. I also have Lanterns, a maintained nursery school, in my patch; I thank its headteacher, Lynsay Falkingham, for her persistent and focused contact with me.
I will start with some positives. We all welcome the fact that the Government committed to an increase in early years education investment in last week’s spending review. That is another example of the Government recognising the crucial role that early education has in improving future attainment and economic success for the wider economy. As one of my constituency providers put it in an email to me this morning:
“I hope that in your debate, you are able to put across to the House the importance of sound Early Years Care and Education. The future of our country, our leaders, our doctors, engineers, teachers, key workers…rests in the hands of Early Years teachers and practitioners.”
I congratulate the hon. Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) on securing this debate and on the powerful and effective speech that he made. I am delighted to see you in the Chair, Ms Ali.
We have an early years crisis. Ofsted reports that there were 14,000 fewer childcare providers last March than in March 2015, because of the market failure that the hon. Member for Winchester described. We all recognise that the pandemic has made things much worse. Provider numbers fell by another 500 in just three months this year. It is a fragile sector. Striking research that the Department commissioned from NatCen and Frontier Economics, published in October, stated that 45% of open group-based providers and 55% of open childminders
“reported that they believe it will be financially sustainable to continue for another year or longer”.
In other words, more than half of group-based providers expect to close within a year.
Even maintaining current provision will be a big challenge, and policy announcements so far are nowhere near enough. Like the hon. Member for Winchester, I welcomed the additional funding for maintained nurseries in the spending review, and I was pleased that the Minister said she will soon announce a long-term settlement for maintained nurseries. I hope that we might hear something about that this afternoon. Last year’s Frontier Economics report on maintained nurseries pointed out that they do a great job in supporting children with special educational needs, as the hon. Member for Winchester reminded us, and supporting parents and families as well.
The Minister for School Standards, the right hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb), visited Sheringham Nursery in my constituency in October last year. It works brilliantly with disadvantaged children—for example, supporting their parents to teach them when they are not at nursery. I pay tribute to the head, Dr Julian Grenier, for all his work and the work of his team, which has a really big, positive impact in the local community.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Ms Ali. I add my congratulations to my neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine), on securing this important debate this afternoon.
Hampshire is reasonably well represented here this afternoon, but I do not want colleagues to think that that is because there is a particular problem in Hampshire with early years provision. I can assure everybody that there is not. Indeed, we have some of the highest quality early years provision in the entire country.
Over the last eight months or so, providers have been keen to emphasise to me the challenges that they have faced during the pandemic, and the challenges that they have risen to: making their premises covid-secure and ensuring that they are open for the children of key workers. In the regular Zoom calls that I have had with providers, they have been keen to emphasise the significant financial impact on the sector.
I was struck by the comments that I heard from one provider, who said that each and every month, with the number of reduced places that he could provide allowing for social distancing, he would be running his premises at a loss of £1,000 per month, which is simply unsustainable. When faced with those sorts of economics, providers take very difficult decisions and decide to no longer open their doors, which causes a reduction in the overall spaces available.
I do not intend to do a march around every childcare provider in my constituency this afternoon, but it is fair to say that they are very varied. As constituency Members of Parliament and, in many instances, as parents, we want to make sure that there is variety, whether it be the small village pre-school of the type I attended back in the 1970s or the larger more formal childcare settings, the individual childminders, those attached to schools or the maintained sector. It is absolutely right that there is variety, so that there is choice for parents and so that those facilities can be conveniently located.
The first few years of life have a crucial impact on a person’s prospects for happiness, success and opportunity in adulthood, so providing the best learning opportunities in the early years is one of the most effective long-term means to tackle serious social problems, such as antisocial behaviour, drug abuse and crime. Early-years education can truly be an engine for social mobility, and I welcome the commitment and investment in this crucial sector by successive Conservative Governments since 2010.
I particularly want to speak up today for the maintained nursery schools, of which I have three in my constituency —St Margaret’s, Hampden Way and Brookhill, which are grouped together in the Barnet Early Years Alliance. I pay tribute to the outstanding work that they do.
As we have heard today, maintained nursery schools have been kept afloat since the introduction of the national funding formula by transitional supplementary funding. In providing that money, the Government have recognised the additional requirements placed on these schools and the fact that they reflect additional costs, but the allocation of supplementary funding is based on historic discrepancies, reflecting school budgets as they happened to be in 2016. That has left Barnet schools and schools in other areas without any supplementary funding at all and they are in serious financial difficulties as a result.
I welcome the extra £60 million in the spending review. I thank the Minister and her Treasury colleagues for listening to representations from me, my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer), many in this room and, of course, the two all-party parliamentary groups, but we must reform the way the money is allocated to deliver a fairer distribution based on need, rather than historical accident.
Schools in Barnet and other boroughs in the same position such as Harrow and Camden simply cannot hold out much longer. The situation is becoming desperate. The whole sector, of course, has been waiting for over three years for the long-term settlement promised by the Government. For us in Barnet, that is three years without even the supplementary funding that others have received.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Ali, and I thank the hon. Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) for bringing this important debate to Westminster Hall. I would love to spend my time talking about the long-term future of nursery provision, because we have all agreed that a child’s start in life is vital, but covid-19 means that we have to deal with the immediate crisis facing nursery schools if we are to have any nursery provision in the future.
Nurseries and nursery workers have been absolute champions throughout the crisis, having stayed open throughout the pandemic to care for the children of key workers—and what thanks have they got for it? It is difficult, at times, to hear members of the Government get to their feet, thank nurseries and say how important the workers are, but not reimburse them for their covid costs—personal protective equipment and adjustments to buildings and schools. All that has come out of their existing, dwindling budgets.
On the issue of budgets, I want to raise the local situation in Luton, where Flying Start children’s centres sadly face closure. Over the summer, our council was backed into a corner by the Government and forced to find savings of £22 million after passenger numbers at Luton airport, one of our biggest revenue raisers, collapsed because of the pandemic. Along with my hon. Friend the Member for Luton South (Rachel Hopkins), I have pleaded with the Government to listen, spelling out what even more cuts would mean to the people of Luton—even more difficult decisions forced on the council by the Government from Westminster, including cuts to children’s services.
I am here to plead with the Minister: meet us and work with us, and give Luton Borough Council the resources it needs to save Flying Start, which are vital for children, parents, families and our town. Nearly 2,000 local people signed a petition to save Flying Start over the summer and 500 parents have joined the Facebook group that is organising to save the centres. If the Government do not act, there will be a devastating impact on families and young people in the community who rely on the services—the pregnancy club, antenatal education, feeding classes, breastfeeding café, baby massage, baby talk, stay and play, messy play, and sing and sign. All those courses will be gone.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) for securing this debate, and I thank the Minister for all she has done to campaign for better opportunities for early childhood education and intervention, and for understanding how great an impact that has on the overall levelling-up agenda.
Children in low-income households tend to experience poor home learning environments; a substantial gap in academic attainment between the poorest and richest children is clear by the time they begin school. The 2010 review by Frank Field, a former Member of this House, on poverty and life chances found that 55% of children in the bottom 20% of attainment in school at the age of seven will remain at the bottom until the age of 16. However, if a parent shows a sustained interest in a child’s early education, their chances of living in poverty as an adult decrease by 25 percentage points.
Early intervention is key to reducing poverty and creating the levelling-up agenda in the long term. Estimates of savings to the public purse as a result of better early years intervention during the first 1,000 days of a child’s life predict that the Government could save approximately £15 billion annually.
A recent report published by King’s College London found that young people who had secure attachments in early childhood had lower levels of antisocial behaviour than those with insecure attachment. The study found that young people securely attached to their mother cost the public purse an average of £6,743, and those who were insecurely attached cost more than £10,000. It is an interesting study.
Family and parental challenges have presented themselves through covid. A Centre for Social Justice report found that parents, especially fathers, face a wide range of challenges with regard to family units, especially during pregnancy and the early years. Six in 10 fathers told the CSJ that they had no conversations at all with midwives about their role. For health visitors, it was approaching half—44% of all fathers told the CSJ that they received little or no advice from them about their role as a father. More than four in 10—41%—of fathers who have a nearby children’s centre have never been invited to or attended any children’s centre activity, despite a legal requirement for children’s centres to engage with fathers as a hard-to-reach group.
It is very good to see you in the Chair, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) on securing this important debate.
I acknowledge the important work of nurseries and early years settings in my constituency; they have been core social infrastructure in the area. They are at the heart of child development, but also support parents in their work and ease family budgets. I particularly mention a maintained nursery school in Alton, in my constituency, called Bushy Leaze, which does high value work with children with special needs, supporting parents, doing outreach in the community and partnering local schools.
I also acknowledge the commitment of the Government to early years education and childcare, with no fewer than five extensions to early years and childcare entitlements since 2010: the 15 hours’, then 30 hours’ tax-free childcare; the 85% reimbursement under universal credit; and, crucially for this debate, the offer of 15 hours for two-year-olds.
Finances in this sector are difficult—they were hard even before the pandemic, and they have become worse. Like others, I welcome the £44 million. I know that the Department does regular analysis of cost structures in this sector, but that clearly still remains difficult to manage in some cases. I hope the Minister will keep that under review, make sure that the process is transparent, and, as time goes on, peg that to cost increases, particularly when it comes to the national living wage.
In the longer term, there is more that we can do to ease cost pressures on the sector, particularly with trying to spread out the demand on the offers for three and four-year-olds, when there are more children in the summer term than in the autumn term, but there have to be staff for the whole year.
Maintained nurseries are more costly, partly because they do more. Like others, I welcome the continuation of the supplemental funding, but the sector really needs long-term visibility and security in its funding. I welcome the fact that the Minister has said that there will be more to say on that soon. I hope it is possible to tie that in with a wider look at the sector and how all parts of it fit together.
3:40 pm
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I shall do my best.
I think I speak for many when I say that our childcare providers have really been the fourth emergency service during the pandemic, caring for the carers and helping the helpers. That has been so important to keep the show on the road, and it shows how important it is that we support the sector going forward. As the National Day Nurseries Association says in its excellent recent report:
“A plan for jobs needs a plan for childcare.”
To stick with the good news, it is very good that the Government are implementing our manifesto promise to provide 30 hours of funded childcare each week for parents of three and four-year-olds, which should increase the availability of affordable early education provision. Just because that is the right policy, however, it is not without unintended consequence.
I really appreciate that the Chancellor recently met me and representatives from the APPG for childcare and early education in Downing Street to discuss making childcare more accessible and affordable across the PVI sector. We did that because we cannot duck the fact that there remains a serious underfunding issue that has, unfortunately, been exacerbated by the covid-19 pandemic.
I have previously described to the House that the sector is experiencing a form of market failure—I stand by that—but that could also be a social failure if we get this wrong. In reality, the financial implications have often meant closures in the most disadvantaged areas, as providers have been forced to cross-subsidise their income—often unsuccessfully—with parental fees. The sector has struggled to make ends meet for years, and many providers feel that they have reach the end of the road as we reach the end of 2020.
By September last year—well before the pandemic hit—there had been a 153% increase in nursery closures since the 30 hours’ free childcare policy was introduced. In essence, we have delivered one part of sustainability for the future, but we now need to finish the job by increasing funding for settings to a sustainable level. Many of the providers that I speak to discuss market failure with me. It is little wonder when 25% of providers across the country could face permanent closure within the year. Recent research found that 72% of maintained nursery schools expect to end the year in deficit, raising the risk of further closures in the maintained sector, too.
The whole sector faces a real challenge, not only because of the effects of the pandemic but, more importantly, because of an unsustainable position at the heart of the sector’s funding, which we have to rectify. The issue affects every Member of the House—it is good to see such turnout on a cold and wet Thursday afternoon—because the impact across our country will be stark if we get it wrong. I would argue that we need a complete overhaul of the current system to ensure long-term sustainability in the sector and value for taxpayers’ money.
Prior to covid, the funding gap in the early years sector was estimated to be £824 million. At that point, there was already a 37% funding deficit between the hourly costs of delivering a funded childcare place for a two-year-old and the rate paid to providers, and a 20% funding deficit for places for three and four-year-olds. That is not a sustainable long-term position. Those figures are based on pre-covid occupancy rates. Settings are still struggling despite now being allowed to remain open to care for and educate our children. The funding gap has had a cumulative effect as the years have gone by. I passionately believe that addressing that gap would go some way towards reversing that market failure and the pattern of closures that we see all too often.
In short, I would like a funding mechanism to increase funding rates in line with the rising costs of delivering childcare. Statutory wage rises, increases in pension contributions and inflation rates all erode the balance that providers must maintain to remain financially viable. The £66 million increase in early years spending in this financial year, which was announced at the 2019 spending round, was obviously a welcome cash injection. Sadly, many settings saw it as a real-terms funding cut once inflation rates and the minimum wage rise in April had been taken into account, and I have heard that over and over again. Financial constraints also mean that nursery owners are largely unable to offer their staff long-term career progression and incentives for upskilling and gaining qualifications. We heard very powerfully about this at a recent meeting of our APPG.
Of course, covid has had a particularly savage impact on the sector, with increased costs and decreased revenues for many settings. There has been a decline in occupancy rates and child places, as well as increased costs to make the settings that are open safe through the personal protective equipment and additional cleaning that is obviously necessary. With just a quarter of providers saying that they expect to make a profit between now and March 2021, we have to take action to protect them for the future.
Last week’s spending review included a pledge from the Chancellor of £44 million of additional spending on early education, on top of the money confirmed in 2019. This is good news, of course: those vital funds will increase the hourly rate paid to providers for the Government’s free hours offer, and are also a step towards sustainability for the sector. However, the underlying problems with structural funding and distribution by local authorities remain acute, and will remain so unless they are properly addressed. An independent, meaningful review into the current system for childcare and early years funding will give us the chance to address the underlying, systemic problems with the early years national funding formula, to ensure some long-term sustainability.
Four years after the introduction of the early years national funding formula I mentioned, the maintained nursery sector is still waiting for stop-gap funding to be replaced with a long-term formula that addresses the historical discrepancies and funds all nursery schools viably. The announcement of £60 million in supplementary funding for maintained nursery schools in 2021-22 is hugely welcome, but there are some crucial next steps. First, funding should become a permanent part of the early years funding settlement, not a year-by-year add-on. Being in such uncertain terrain is adding huge stress to the people who run these settings. Secondly, this funding should be distributed on an equitable basis across the country, not on the basis of historical precedent, as is currently the case.
It is crucial that future funding arrangements for maintained nursery schools adequately provide for them to meet their statutory obligations as schools, which they are: for example, funding for additional costs such as the well-deserved teachers’ pay award. While that extra £60 million in funding is welcome, it is clear that here, too, a long-term sustainable financial solution must be found for the sector as a whole.
For all providers, the early years national funding formula can be—if we are being polite—something of a minefield. Requirements and entitlement distributions differ greatly across different national authorities, which creates a complex funding context for providers operating in one region, let alone several. It is complex, bureaucratic and incoherent, and we are often told that it makes a tough job even harder. The current system must work better for settings and parents, but also for taxpayers—our constituents.
Cash for funded entitlement places relies on local authorities estimating demand, and then on them making corrections to this rough draft partway through the financial and academic years. This has created an unhelpful culture of large contingency funds and underspends of taxpayers’ money that is neither providing the childcare provision it is meant to, nor supporting the settings it is meant for. Millions of pounds intended to deliver funded childcare places is often either redirected into other parts of local authority education budgets, or held in reserve to cover the inconsistencies that emerge throughout the year as they try to flatten things out.
A freedom of information request to all English local authorities found that three quarters of councils had underspent their early years allocation, which amounts to more than £65 million failing to reach providers for eligible children. It showed that contingency budgets of up to £32 million were being held to allow for funding corrections this year. This is taxpayers’ money, and we have to do better. Urgent reform to safeguard the future of nurseries and early years settings across the PVI and maintained sectors is desperately needed, for all the reasons I have set out. That will ensure better value for money for the taxpayer, maintain this vital early education—particularly for disadvantaged children, who need it most—and protect the jobs of 360,000 people who work in the sector, the vast majority of whom are women, while also enhancing their career development prospects.
For me, this is an issue of social justice. I am very pleased that Ministers are working with us to do all that they can. I know the Minister here today will take on board the concerns I have highlighted. We have shown we can work together to protect health throughout the pandemic. It is time we worked together to protect the long-term future of our education system. That needs to start with early education, so let us get it right from the very start.
Maintained nurseries have more children than average with special educational needs and disabilities. Sheringham has 40 out of a roll of 200. It runs the Newham early years hub, supporting 100 private nurseries and childminders to improve education quality and inclusion, and increasing workforce standards and workforce numbers. It also runs the East London Research School along with a primary and a secondary school to improve the quality and impact of professional development. Those are all valuable and positive contributions.
Funding for maintained nurseries must recognise the greater contribution that they make. I am particularly keen to hear from the Minister about the longer-term funding settlement that she is planning.
I want to pay particular tribute to Lou Simmons of Abbotswood Day Nursery, who has provided me not only with the facts and figures about her business and the challenge it faces, but also a commentary on the wider sector. As she pointed out to me, the costs faced by her setting will not be identical to every setting, precisely because there is such a variety; but they are probably not atypical.
The stark reality is that with staff costs, pension costs, increases in utility costs and personal protective equipment costs all going up, the funding for childcare has not kept pace with the pressures faced. The £4.55 per funded hour per child over the age of three does not meet her operating costs of £6.80, and they have no choice but to make a charge for consumables, which parents do not necessarily understand, having listened very clearly to the Government’s mantra that it is 30 free hours per week. She will still run at a loss for every hour, every child. I know that my hon. Friend the Minister, who is working hard on this, is going to talk about the £44 million early years injection, but that is simply not enough to begin to cover the 75p per child per hour average loss made by providers such as Lou.
There is a stark reality to this. Just like the village pre-schools that have already closed, we will see the loss of childcare provision at a time when we know that women need to be able to access quality childcare to make sure that they do not lose out further in the employment market. Statistics provided by Mumsnet earlier this week, from a survey it conducted post pandemic, show that a significant proportion of mothers who use childcare—70%—were emphasising that they were struggling to balance the requirements of work and childcare at home.
These businesses, as we have heard, are run by women, employing women and providing opportunities for other women to go out to work. As my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester said, there is a social cost, which my hon. Friend Minister needs to step up and address.
I urge the Minister today to make a commitment, right here and right now, to reform the allocation of supplementary funding and bring forward proposals for consultation to do that as soon as possible. I urge her also to secure the long-term funding settlement that the Department for Education promised back in 2017 but has still not been able to deliver. That is a funding settlement that reflects the level of resource needed to run a maintained nursery school—so, more than the hand-to-mouth levels of supplementary funding that the sector has had to survive on for the past few years.
There are dedicated professionals in maintained nursery schools throughout the country who are ready and waiting for that new system leader role, centres of excellence and specialists in SEND provision. They are enthusiastic about the challenge, so let us seize the opportunity to save those schools and empower them to continue their inspirational work, providing a brighter and better future for the children in their care.
Flying Start provides a support network for parents—particularly mothers—many of whom do not have access to other local support or guidance. We have seen throughout the pandemic how important it is that new parents should be supported after the birth of a baby. I know that from personal experience. In particular, some new mums suffer from isolation, depression, anxiety or domestic violence. We need to make sure that they have access to support in the children’s centres.
After 10 years of austerity and cuts to such vital services, we know what we are losing when those services go. We have seen it play out already. Inequalities grow further. Child poverty in Luton will rise. The support that people depend on will be pulled away. People in Luton have grown used to that indifference, and that is incredibly sad. The Government promised the country, and people in Luton, that they would do whatever it takes to get us through the pandemic; but, with cuts like these handed down from Westminster, we are making Luton pay the price for their broken promise. In finding alternative sources of money, as we did with the airport to fill the gaps left over the last years, people in Luton and our council did everything asked of us. All we ask is that the Government keep their promise.
[Mr Phillip Hollobone in the Chair]
Whether it is cuts such as those in Luton, the loss of more than 3,000 health visitors nationally or billions cut from public health budgets and children’s services, the Government really have a blind spot when it comes to early years. I hope they listen to examples such as what is happening to constituents in Luton, give us the resources we need to save those services and act to support parents and families.
Children’s centres and family hubs are vital in tackling the issue of attainment through early intervention. Family hubs are local one-stop shops offering families with children and young people aged zero to 19 early help to overcome difficulties and build stronger relationships. Children’s centres do the same thing in many of our communities, including my constituency of Beaconsfield. Such provision is typically co-located with superb early years help and support. The Ivers Family Centre is in my constituency, and many local residents, including one of our councillors, Wendy Mallen, campaigned tirelessly to save it. It is vital for helping children close the attainment gap and make sure they have every opportunity to succeed in life.
The purpose of family hubs is to co-locate and co-ordinate all family services available in a community and provide a visible and welcoming access point for any parent—mother and father—to appropriate support services or information about family-related matters. The CSJ set out in its 2014 report why family hubs and children’s centres are so important. They strengthen families regardless of their structure, with a focus on children’s development and parental relationships. They prevent family breakdown through relationship support at key points and support families in difficulty with conflict resolution and support for separated families. That could save the state millions of pounds in the long term, because if there is early intervention not only in the child’s life, but in the lives of the parents to give them support, it could make all the difference.
As we come out of covid, I hope the Minister will consider this type of funding, so that we can help those who have suffered the most during lockdown and we can help get everyone in the country back on track.
I do not have the time to give most of my speech, in the circumstances. Others have said how important early years education is. It is fundamental for social mobility and for dealing with some of the most entrenched disadvantages in our society.
We have seen an increased prevalence of children presenting with high needs. That is because of a combination of greater diagnosis and awareness, and perhaps some greater underlying prevalence as well. Whatever the reason, we know that the earlier we can help and support those children and their families, the better for them and, later on, the more it will ease the pressure on the school system.
In that wider look at how the sector works and how it all fits together, ideally there would be a geographically distributed network of maintained nursery schools with a defined set of core services, one of which would be to support the private, voluntary and independent sector nurseries in the area. There is also more opportunity to use primary school settings. A couple of years ago, we put in place a capital fund to allow more of that, but there is far more potential. It is important that those nurseries include some year-round provision as well.
We need a people plan, because this is all about the wonderful people who work in our nurseries. I welcome the fact that in the T-levels programme, early years and childcare is one of the first T-Levels to come on stream.
There are one or two other very important people in a child’s life: mum and dad. The home situation may be becoming more complex in the current time, partly because of the developments in electronics and so on, but we know that about a fifth of the difference in the development of cognitive ability is to do with parental engagement. It is very difficult for public policy to start getting involved in that arena, but nursery schools and others working in early years can play an important part in supporting parents with the support they are looking for.
I hope the Government will continue with and grow the Hungry Little Minds campaign, which uses ambient opportunities for people on the bus or train, eating their breakfast cereal or about to go to bed, to help to promote early literacy. The BBC has an important role to play, too.
If the erstwhile right hon. Member for Birkenhead, Lord Field, was still in this House, he would remind us of the time he was talking to some 15-year-olds at a secondary school in Birkenhead. They said there were two things they really wanted to learn more about at school—how to make lifelong friendships and how to be good parents. Everybody has a huge part to play. We need to work out how the social infrastructure that we have been talking about can best support all this important work.