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Best Start

Best Start is a United Kingdom government program providing integrated early intervention services to young children and their families, with a focus on disadvantaged communities to enhance health, development, and educational readiness.^[1] Originally launched as Sure Start in 1998 under the Labour government, it targeted areas of high deprivation with multidisciplinary support including parenting classes, health advice, and childcare access.^[2] The initiative expanded rapidly in the 2000s, establishing over 3,500 children's centres by 2010 that delivered localized services aimed at preventing social exclusion and promoting child outcomes.^[3] Evaluations have shown modest positive effects on children's social behavior and cognitive skills in intensively served areas, though broader impacts on attainment have been limited and dependent on sustained funding.^[2]^[3] Significant controversies arose from austerity measures post-2010, resulting in the closure of more than 1,000 children's centres and reduced service reach, which studies link to stagnant or declining early childhood metrics in affected regions.^[4] In response, the 2024 Labour government pledged to revive the framework through up to 1,000 Best Start Family Hubs, integrating health, education, and social support to address persistent gaps in early years provision.^[5] This evolution underscores ongoing debates over the program's cost-effectiveness and scalability amid varying empirical evidence of long-term benefits.^[2]

Origins and Early Development

Announcement and Initial Objectives

The Sure Start initiative was announced on 14 July 1998 by Gordon Brown, Chancellor of the Exchequer, as part of the Labour government's comprehensive spending review, with the explicit aim of providing disadvantaged young children with improved life chances through targeted early intervention.^[6] The announcement committed £540 million in funding from 1999 to 2002, primarily allocated to England, to establish an initial network of 250 Sure Start Local Programmes (SSLPs) in the country's most deprived wards, selected based on indices of multiple deprivation.^[7] These pilots were designed as area-based initiatives, concentrating resources in high-poverty locales rather than universally, to disrupt intergenerational cycles of disadvantage identified in a preceding government review of child outcomes.^[8] Drawing inspiration from the United States' Head Start program—launched in 1965 to support low-income preschool children—Sure Start adapted the model for the UK context by emphasizing community-led, multi-agency delivery tailored to local needs in persistently deprived urban and rural areas.^[9] Unlike Head Start's primary focus on preschool education, Sure Start prioritized holistic family support over standalone childcare, integrating services to foster parental involvement and prevent social exclusion from the outset.^[10] The core objectives centered on enhancing child health and development, promoting better educational readiness, and strengthening family stability for children from pregnancy through age five, with services encompassing outreach, home visiting, and advice on parenting, nutrition, and employment.^[11] By concentrating on evidence of rising early childhood disadvantage—such as higher rates of low birth weight and developmental delays in poor households—the programme sought causal improvements in outcomes through proactive, preventive measures rather than reactive remediation.^[8] Initial implementation in the late 1990s involved partnerships among local authorities, voluntary organizations, and parents to tailor programmes, aiming for nationwide rollout of the 250 pilots by 2001.^[7]

Launch of Sure Start Programmes

The Sure Start Local Programmes (SSLPs) were launched in 1999 as an area-based initiative targeting disadvantaged communities in England, with the first 60 programmes announced that year and managed by a dedicated Sure Start Unit within the Department for Education and Employment.^[12] These early programmes emphasized flexible, community-driven delivery to support children under four and their families, drawing on principles of universal access within selected locales to minimize stigma associated with targeted interventions.^[13] Initial funding allocated £450 million for rollout, focusing on holistic early intervention without formal means-testing, thereby encouraging broad participation from eligible residents in high-need areas.^[11] Administrative setup relied on local partnerships comprising representatives from health authorities, education providers, social services, voluntary organizations, and parents, tasked with tailoring services to community needs while ensuring coordinated delivery across sectors.^[7] This collaborative model aimed to integrate existing resources rather than impose top-down mandates, with programme boards holding decision-making authority to foster ownership and responsiveness.^[14] Core initial services included outreach and home visiting by trained workers to build family engagement, parenting support through classes and advice on child development, organized play and learning sessions for young children, and access to primary health services such as advice on nutrition, immunizations, and maternal well-being.^[15] By 2003, the programme had expanded to 524 SSLPs, selected based on deprivation metrics including the Index of Multiple Deprivation, which prioritized wards in the 20% most disadvantaged quintile nationally, encompassing roughly half of children living below the poverty line.^[16]^[8] This growth reflected increased budgetary commitments, including £948 million from 2002 to 2004 to double the number of programmes, while maintaining the non-stigmatizing ethos through open-door policies in designated zones.^[7] Early implementation evaluations noted variability in local execution due to the decentralized structure, but the model prioritized evidence-informed adaptations over uniform standardization.^[13]

Expansion and Structural Evolution

Transition to Children's Centres

In the mid-2000s, the UK Labour government under Tony Blair initiated a policy shift to consolidate the dispersed Sure Start Local Programmes (SSLPs) into a network of centralized Children's Centres, aiming to enhance scalability and integration of early childhood services. This transition began in earnest around 2003, with formal commitments announced to establish 3,500 Children's Centres across England by 2010, evolving from the initial 260 SSLPs launched in 1999.^[17] The Every Child Matters (ECM) framework, introduced in 2003 following the Victoria Climbié inquiry and codified in the Children Act 2004, provided the overarching mandate for integrated children's services, embedding Children's Centres within a broader structure to support five key outcomes: being healthy, staying safe, enjoying and achieving, making a positive contribution, and achieving economic well-being. This policy evolution integrated Sure Start's area-based initiatives into phase-based rollouts, with Phase 1 (2004-2006) primarily repurposing existing SSLPs into the new centres.^[18]^[19] The rationale emphasized operational efficiency through co-location of services, enabling streamlined delivery of family support, early education, and childcare under one roof, which was seen as more effective for reaching and sustaining engagement in disadvantaged communities compared to fragmented SSLPs. Early evaluations of SSLPs had revealed implementation challenges and uneven impacts, prompting a standardized model to improve consistency and resource allocation.^[20]^[21] By 2010, the network achieved near-universal coverage in England's most deprived areas, with over 3,100 centres operational and national standards established for quality assurance, including requirements for multi-agency partnerships and outreach to vulnerable families. This expansion marked a shift from targeted pilots to a comprehensive infrastructure, prioritizing disadvantaged locales while extending reach to broader communities.^[20]^[22]

Peak Coverage and Operations

By 2010, the Sure Start programme had expanded into a network of approximately 3,500 Children's Centres across England, achieving the government's target of universal coverage in the 30% most disadvantaged areas and serving an estimated 550,000 children under five annually in those locales.^[23]^[20] These centres operated under local authority governance, with each designated by the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) following statutory requirements under the Childcare Act 2006, which mandated integrated early education, childcare, family support, and health services.^[24] Central oversight involved annual performance assessments and funding allocations tied to reach and quality metrics, ensuring alignment with national standards while allowing local flexibility in delivery. Routine operations emphasized multi-agency coordination, with centres typically staffed by a mix of local authority employees, health visitors, and voluntary sector partners to deliver drop-in sessions, parenting groups, and outreach activities.^[12] Practices were informed by ongoing national evaluations, such as the National Evaluation of Sure Start (NESS), which collected longitudinal data on service uptake and implementation fidelity to refine protocols like targeted family literacy interventions and routine health screenings for under-fives.^[25] Data reporting to the DCSF enabled monitoring of key indicators, including attendance rates exceeding 80% in high-performing areas, though disparities emerged due to uneven local resourcing.^[26] The programme integrated with broader welfare frameworks, such as linking centre referrals to Jobcentre Plus for parental employment support and collaborating with primary care trusts for immunisation drives, fostering a holistic approach to early intervention.^[27] However, parliamentary scrutiny highlighted early operational variances, with some centres in rural districts struggling with transport access and staffing retention compared to urban counterparts, prompting guidance updates to standardize core delivery elements.^[28] This period marked the zenith of operational scale, with annual budgets approaching £2.7 billion (in constant prices) sustaining nationwide functionality prior to subsequent fiscal adjustments.^[2]

Reforms and Setbacks

Austerity-Driven Reductions

Following the May 2010 formation of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government, austerity policies were enacted to address a public sector deficit exceeding 10% of GDP, stemming from the 2008 global financial crisis and bank bailouts. These measures included substantial reductions in central grants to local authorities, with Sure Start Children's Centres funding de-ringfenced and merged into the Early Intervention Grant from April 2011, allowing councils discretion in allocation amid overall local government spending cuts of 26% in real terms between 2010/11 and 2019/20.^[29]^[7] The policy shifts contributed to contractions in the network, with designated Children's Centres falling from a peak of 3,620 in 2010/11 to approximately 3,050 (including 2,350 physical centres and 700 linked sites) by June 2019. By 2015, at least 313 physical closures had occurred since 2010, alongside widespread service mergers and reductions, as local authorities prioritized statutory duties over non-mandatory provisions.^[23]^[30]^[31] Reforms emphasized targeting resources toward the 20% most deprived areas and improving efficiency, with 2013 guidance permitting local authorities to designate "access points"—alternative physical or digital locations for core services—rather than maintaining universal full centres in every community. This flexibility, extended under broader family policy frameworks like the Children and Families Act 2014, enabled councils to adapt to budget constraints while retaining statutory duties to secure sufficient services for vulnerable families.^[32]^[33]

Shift to Family Hubs Model

The transition to the Family Hubs model began in 2019, when the UK government allocated £65 million to support 77 local authorities in developing integrated family support networks, rebranding and repurposing select existing Children's Centres to provide broader services beyond early years childcare. This shift addressed limitations in the prior Sure Start and Children's Centres framework by extending reach to families with children up to age 19, incorporating targeted interventions such as perinatal mental health support, parenting guidance, and employment-related advice to foster self-sufficiency.^[34] The model emphasized evidence from evaluations of earlier programs, prioritizing preventive, holistic support over siloed services to improve long-term family outcomes.^[35] By 2023, approximately 150 Family Hubs were operational across pilot areas, with expansion accelerating under the Conservative administration to reach around 400 hubs by 2024, primarily in upper-tier local authorities.^[36] These hubs adopted a data-driven approach, using local needs assessments and metrics like child poverty indices to allocate resources and tailor interventions, shifting from universal access models to more focused targeting of vulnerable families.^[37] The expanded age remit (0-19) enabled seamless transitions from infant support to youth services, including emotional wellbeing programs and skills development, reflecting causal insights that early interventions alone insufficiently address adolescent risks.^[38] To promote sustainability amid fiscal constraints, the model stressed multi-agency partnerships, particularly with voluntary, community, and faith sector organizations, which deliver specialized services like debt counseling and domestic abuse support while reducing reliance on direct state funding.^[34] Local authorities were encouraged to commission VCS providers for flexible, community-embedded delivery, enhancing cost-effectiveness and responsiveness compared to the centralized operations of predecessor centres. This collaborative structure drew from pilot evaluations indicating higher engagement rates through trusted non-statutory partners.^[39]

Services and Delivery

Core Services Offered

The core services of Best Start programmes, building on Sure Start and Children's Centres models, integrate health interventions such as antenatal classes, postnatal support including breastfeeding guidance, and routine vaccinations administered via on-site health visitors.^[40]^[1] Nutritional advice focuses on infant feeding and family diet to address early developmental risks, often audited against national standards like those outlined in the Core Purpose framework for Children's Centres.^[41]^[42] Educational offerings emphasize early learning through structured groups promoting language development, literacy, and play-based activities, alongside targeted speech and language therapy referrals for children under five.^[41]^[2] These services evolved from informal drop-in sessions in initial Sure Start phases to formalized group programmes in later iterations, with evidence-based delivery ensuring fidelity to interventions like family learning sessions.^[43] Family support components include parenting programmes teaching child development and behavior management, alongside practical assistance such as debt counseling, benefits navigation, and employment training linkages.^[40]^[44] In contemporary Family Hubs under the Best Start framework, these incorporate perinatal mental health support and home learning resources, shifting toward coordinated referrals and digital platforms for accessibility, while maintaining core empirical focus on reducing early adversities.^[45]^[46] Pre-austerity audits reported annual service reach exceeding 100,000 families through standardized health and support metrics.^[20]

Target Population and Access

The Sure Start programme primarily targeted families residing in the most deprived wards, selected based on the Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD), focusing on the bottom quintile of areas ranked by socioeconomic disadvantage, including metrics such as income, employment, health, education, and crime.^[47] Services were intended for children from the antenatal period through to school entry at age 5, with eligibility extending universally within these geo-targeted locales rather than through individual means-testing to encourage broad uptake and avoid stigmatization.^[48] This approach prioritized causal intervention in high-risk environments over universal provision, reflecting an emphasis on deprivation indices to allocate resources efficiently.^[49] Subsequent expansions into Children's Centres maintained this deprivation-focused targeting, with centres clustered in the 30% most deprived areas, while the transition to Family Hubs under models like Best Start has broadened support to families up to age 19, still prioritizing the highest deprivation quintiles and relative poverty indicators.^[35] Access operated via open-door policies at physical centres or hubs, allowing drop-in attendance without formal referrals, though geo-targeting ensured concentration in underserved locales.^[48] ^[50] Participation rates were notably higher in urban deprived areas due to proximity and density, with evaluations indicating stronger engagement where centres were embedded in high-need communities, compared to lower uptake in rural settings hampered by transport barriers.^[51] Efforts to mitigate these included outreach initiatives and flexible scheduling, yet challenges persisted among hardest-to-reach subgroups, such as certain ethnic minorities and isolated families, where barriers like mistrust or logistical issues reduced effective access despite open policies.^[52] ^[53] Overall, while not strictly means-tested, the model's reliance on deprivation mapping aimed to maximize reach to at-risk populations without universal dilution.^[54]

Evaluation of Effectiveness

Evidence of Positive Impacts

A 2025 analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), drawing on longitudinal data from the rollout of Sure Start Children's Centres as a natural experiment, found that early access to these centres reduced unauthorised school absences by 15% among 15-year-olds in disadvantaged areas.^[2] This effect persisted into adolescence, contributing to broader improvements in attendance and engagement.^[55] The same IFS evaluation identified positive impacts on educational attainment, with children living within 2.5 km of a centre during their early years showing a one percentage point higher likelihood of achieving five good GCSEs (grades 9-4 including English and maths) at age 16.^[56] For children eligible for free school meals—a proxy for disadvantage—exposure equated to an average gain of up to three GCSE grades relative to counterfactuals.^[57] These outcomes were attributed to enhanced early support services, including parenting programs and health advice, which fostered foundational skills.^[58] Health benefits included sustained reductions in hospital admissions, with a 2019 IFS study estimating that access to centres prevented thousands of primary school-age hospitalisations annually in deprived locales, particularly for accidents and chronic conditions among boys.^[59] Sure Start areas saw lower rates of obesity and emergency admissions by primary school end, yielding net NHS savings estimated in the millions.^[60] Longitudinal tracking confirmed these gains extended to improved child development scores in social and emotional domains, with reduced internalising behaviours like anxiety by adolescence.^[2] Criminal justice metrics showed a 13% lower probability of any conviction by age 16 for those exposed early, concentrated in theft and other common youth offences, per 2024-2025 IFS assessments using administrative records.^[61] Custodial sentences dropped by around 20% in these cohorts.^[62] Overall, the program's integrated services generated approximately £2 in public benefits—spanning health, education, and crime reductions—for every £1 invested, based on monetised outcomes from the initial rollout phases.^[63]

Criticisms and Null or Negative Findings

Evaluations of early childhood interventions under the Sure Start framework, which informed the Best Start strategy, revealed null findings on cognitive development in initial assessments. The National Evaluation of Sure Start (NESS) at age three, conducted around 2005, found no significant improvements in cognitive scores or receptive vocabulary among children in Sure Start Local Programme (SSLP) areas compared to similar non-SSLP communities, despite substantial investment in universal access within deprived neighborhoods.^[25] Some analyses indicated potential dips in academic performance for specific subgroups, such as boys or children from non-working households, where exposure correlated with slightly lower attainment trajectories by age five.^[64] Social-emotional outcomes showed negative associations in universal models during 2005-2010 evaluations. NESS data reported higher hyperactivity, conduct problems, and reduced prosocial behavior among SSLP children at age three, alongside increased maternal depression and smoking rates, contrasting with targeted interventions that prioritized high-need families and avoided such dilutions.^[25] Comparisons suggested universal rollout in Sure Start areas exacerbated these issues relative to more selective approaches, as resources spread thinly failed to address concentrated disadvantage effectively. Longer-term follow-ups have documented fade-out of intervention effects. Quasi-experimental analyses of Sure Start cohorts indicated that early gains in health metrics, such as reduced hospitalizations for infections, dissipated by school entry and adolescence, with no persistent divergence in developmental trajectories by age 11 or beyond in multiple matched comparisons.^[49] Randomized and propensity-score studies of analogous programs corroborated this pattern, showing null sustained impacts on cognitive or behavioral domains post-intervention.^[65] Methodological critiques emphasize selection bias in observed benefits. Evaluations of children's centres, including Best Start-aligned services, attribute apparent positives to self-selecting families with higher engagement propensity rather than program causality, as non-participants in similar areas exhibited comparable or superior unadjusted outcomes when controlling for motivation.^[48] This correlational artifact undermines claims of broad net benefits, particularly where uptake remained low among the most disadvantaged.^[66]

Long-Term and Cost-Effectiveness Assessments

Cost-effectiveness evaluations of Sure Start local programmes have yielded estimates of positive net present value, primarily driven by reductions in future public spending on health, special educational needs, and social care. A 2010 national economic evaluation projected lifetime societal benefits of £279 to £557 per eligible child, with two-thirds accruing to the public sector through averted costs in remedial services and increased maternal employment.^[67] More recent analyses incorporating medium-term outcomes reinforce this, attributing £0.6 billion in annual savings across health and care domains at program peak, alongside revenue from higher future earnings.^[55] Long-term impacts, tracked to adolescence and projected into adulthood, show durable but incremental gains in human capital. Access to Sure Start correlated with 15% fewer unauthorized school absences among 15-year-olds and sustained improvements in mental health, contributing to estimated £3.1 billion in elevated lifetime post-tax earnings per child cohort.^[2]^[55] However, these effects remain modest in magnitude, with randomized and quasi-experimental studies indicating that family background and socioeconomic factors exert dominant influences on employment and income trajectories, limiting the program's marginal contribution to GDP growth.^[2] Fiscal scalability analyses reveal mixed returns on the program's expansive rollout, which peaked at £2.7 billion annually in 2023-24 prices. While overall benefit-cost ratios approached 2:1 through combined savings and revenues, critiques emphasize opportunity costs, arguing that equivalent investments in targeted cash transfers or direct family supports could achieve comparable or superior outcomes per pound by bypassing administrative overheads inherent in center-based delivery.^[63] Think tank assessments advocate refining allocation toward high-risk families in the most deprived locales, where effect sizes are amplified, to optimize causal returns amid resource constraints.^[2]

Controversies and Debates

Political Disputes Over Funding

Under the Labour governments from 1997 to 2010, Sure Start—later rebranded in some contexts as Best Start—was positioned as a flagship anti-poverty initiative, with rapid expansion funded through central government allocations that grew from an initial £450 million in 1999 to a peak of £2.7 billion in 2009–10 (in 2023 prices), supporting approximately 3,600 children's centres across England by 2010.^[2] This scaling was justified by Labour as essential for early intervention in disadvantaged areas, though critics within fiscal conservative circles argued it prioritized volume over targeted efficacy amid rising public deficits post-2008 financial crisis.^[7] Following the 2010 election, the Conservative-led coalition and subsequent governments implemented austerity measures, reducing Sure Start funding by over two-thirds between 2010 and 2022, leading to the closure of more than 1,400 centres and a shift toward a more selective Family Hubs model emphasizing evidence-based targeting rather than universal access.^[58]^[68] Conservatives defended these restraints as necessary fiscal prudence to address a £150 billion-plus structural deficit inherited from Labour, redirecting resources to high-need families while devolving more control to local authorities, which they claimed improved efficiency despite Labour accusations of undermining social cohesion.^[69]^[70] Labour countered that the cuts politicized essential services, linking them to rises in child poverty rates from 2.2 million in 2010 to 4.3 million by 2023, though independent analyses noted mixed causal evidence amid broader economic factors.^[71]^[72] Upon Labour's return to power in 2024, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson pledged £500 million to establish up to 1,000 Family Hubs by 2028, ensuring at least one in every English local authority by April 2026, framed as a defense against prior "reform assaults" and a commitment to embedding the model against future fiscal retrenchments.^[71]^[50] This initiative sparked cross-party debate, with Conservatives critiquing it as potentially reversing efficiency gains from targeted allocation without sufficient new evidence of universal benefits, while Labour advocates highlighted risks of further closures exacerbating inequalities in under-resourced areas.^[73]^[35] Accusations of politicization persisted, as both sides invoked selective data on deficit impacts versus service gaps, underscoring tensions between short-term budgetary constraints and long-term preventive spending priorities.^[74]

Evidence-Based Critiques of Expansion

Critiques of the expansion of state-centered early intervention programs like Sure Start and its successors, including family hubs, emphasize gaps in establishing robust causal links between service provision and long-term child outcomes. Evaluations have highlighted challenges in attributing improvements to the interventions themselves, given confounding factors such as self-selection by more engaged families and variability in program implementation across phases. For instance, while short-term gains in health and behavior were observed in early targeted rollouts, medium- to long-term academic outcomes showed inconsistent or null effects in some cohorts, with one analysis noting associations with poorer school performance among users despite universal access intentions.^[51] These findings underscore evidentiary limitations in tracing causal chains from center-based services—such as parenting classes and health visits—to enduring societal benefits, particularly as programs scaled to broader populations where baseline family capabilities varied widely.^[2] A key concern in program design is the substitution effect, where services primarily benefit families who would likely achieve similar outcomes through private or community efforts, thereby generating deadweight loss and reducing net societal returns. The National Evaluation of Sure Start explicitly accounted for deadweight—defined as outcomes occurring without intervention—alongside displacement and substitution in its economic assessment, revealing that additionality was modest in universal phases as resources were absorbed by less disadvantaged households within deprived areas.^[16] This dynamic normalizes dependency on state infrastructure rather than bolstering family autonomy, with evidence suggesting that expansion dilutes efficacy by prioritizing access over targeted intensity, as seen in attenuated impacts during later, less focused implementations.^[3] Policy analyses advocate alternatives like voucher systems or conditional cash transfers, which empirical studies indicate yield higher cost-effectiveness by empowering parental choice and incentivizing specific behaviors without fixed state centers. Meta-analyses of conditional cash transfer programs in comparable contexts demonstrate substantial returns on educational and developmental outcomes per pound spent, often outperforming facility-based interventions through direct family support.^[75] In the UK, schemes akin to vouchers, such as Healthy Start for nutritional aid, have proven effective in boosting targeted health behaviors among low-income families at lower administrative costs than comprehensive hub models.^[76] These mechanisms address evidentiary shortcomings in causal attribution by focusing resources on verifiable actions, potentially mitigating dependency risks inherent in centralized expansion.^[77]

Recent Developments and Future Outlook

Post-2024 Government Initiatives

In July 2025, the Labour government announced the "Giving Every Child the Best Start in Life" strategy, committing £500 million to establish up to 1,000 Best Start Family Hubs across England, with rollout beginning in every local authority from April 2026 and full expansion by 2028.^[50]^[73] These hubs aim to serve as integrated one-stop centers offering services such as early-years education, health support, parenting guidance, debt advice, and activities for children aged 0-5, targeting an additional 500,000 children in disadvantaged communities.^[74]^[5] The initiative expands on approximately 400 family hubs developed under the prior Conservative administration, incorporating lessons from evaluations of earlier programs like Sure Start to prioritize evidence-based interventions in high-need areas.^[72]^[78] Local authorities received initial development grants to prepare infrastructure and partnerships with nurseries, schools, and health services, ensuring hubs address multifaceted family challenges including breastfeeding support, housing issues, and child development milestones.^[79]^[80] This funding ties into the government's broader opportunity mission, with £69 million allocated in the Autumn Budget 2024 for interim family hub delivery in 2025/26 to bridge toward the full Best Start network.^[72] Early implementation focuses on disadvantaged locales, with hubs designed for universal access while emphasizing targeted outreach to mitigate risks identified in prior empirical studies of similar services.^[1]^[81]

Ongoing Evaluations and Projections

The UK government's Best Start in Life strategy incorporates ongoing evaluations modeled on rigorous, independent frameworks akin to those supported by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) and Nuffield Foundation, emphasizing longitudinal tracking of child development outcomes, service uptake, and cost impacts in expanded Family Hubs.^[82]^[1] Interim findings from pilot implementations of Stronger Practice Hubs, evaluated in June 2025, indicate strong suitability of peer-led models for sector support, with high responsiveness to early years providers but calls for enhanced inclusivity metrics in future phases.^[83] These assessments build on the National Evaluation of Start for Life, which continues to monitor integrated services for the first 1,001 days, focusing on measurable improvements in parental engagement and health outcomes via real-time data from local authorities.^[84] Projections for Best Start Family Hubs anticipate nationwide rollout to up to 1,000 sites by 2028, supported by £500 million in funding from 2026 to 2029, potentially extending integrated support to an additional several hundred thousand families in underserved areas, based on current Family Hubs reaching over 500 local authorities.^[1]^[37] However, fiscal analyses highlight sustainability risks, including dependency on sustained public expenditure amid competing budget demands, with IFS noting that achieving the 75% target for five-year-olds at good development levels by 2028 requires addressing implementation variances across regions to avoid diluted impacts.^[82] Policymakers emphasize adaptive monitoring to mitigate repetition of prior initiative shortcomings, such as uneven long-term gains, through evidence-based adjustments.^[85] In devolved contexts, Scotland's Best Start Grants—distinct financial assistance payments introduced in 2018—undergo separate evaluations, with the September 2025 review of the Five Family Payments confirming reduced financial strain at child transition points but underscoring needs for better uptake tracking among non-benefit recipients.^[86] This serves as a comparator to England’s hub-focused model, revealing divergent evidence bases: grants show immediate household relief without integrated service delivery, contrasting projections for hubs' broader causal chains on developmental metrics, though both face scrutiny over scalability under fiscal constraints.^[87]

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The Centre for Social Justice introduced the Family Hubs model in 2007, with its landmark report ... to expand the Family Hubs to all 153 local authorities in the ...
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Where should the new Best Start family hubs be located to ... - Nesta
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Introducing Family Hubs
Family Hubs are centres which, as part of integrated family services ensure families with children and young people aged 0-19 receive early help.
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How to build productive partnerships between LAs and the local VCFS
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Sure Start Services | nidirect
The programme provides support to parents from pregnancy until their child's fourth birthday. With Sure Start's ongoing support, a child can flourish at home, ...<|control11|><|separator|>
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[PDF] Core purpose of Sure Start Children's Centres - Foundation Years
language, literacy and numeracy support, family learning, access to apprenticeships and volunteering opportunities as steps toward employment and links to ...
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[PDF] The Best Start for Life - GOV.UK
The 'Best Start for Life' initiative focuses on the 1,001 critical days from conception to age two, as this period is crucial for building lifelong health and ...
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(PDF) A review of the services offered by English Sure Start ...
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Find a Sure Start Children's Centre - GOV.UK
Sure Start centres give help and advice on child and family health, parenting, money, training and employment. Some centres also provide early learning and ...
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Family Hubs and Start for Life programme: local authority guide ...
Feb 25, 2025 · Guidance for the 75 pre-selected local authorities on the Family Hubs and Start for Life programme, for the 2025 to 2026 financial year.
[46]
[PDF] Family Hubs and Start for Life programme guide 2025–26 - GOV.UK
Feb 26, 2025 · The Family Hubs Model Framework, which includes the criteria for the two stages of family hub transformation: a basic family hub model and a ...
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[PDF] The impact of Sure Start Local Programmes on five year olds and ...
The ultimate goal of Sure Start Local Programmes (SSLPs) was to enhance the life chances for young children growing up in disadvantaged neighbourhoods.
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This report studies the impact of children's centers on child, mother, and family outcomes, including child behavior, cognitive ability, and health.
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[PDF] The health effects of universal early childhood interventions
Aug 13, 2021 · The multifaceted nature of the program means that some of Sure Start's impacts on health could come about through a variety of channels, both ...
[50]
Government revives family services, supporting 500,000 more kids
Jul 6, 2025 · Backed by over £500 million, the rollout will help transform the existing Family Hubs and Start for Life programme and create up to 1,000 hubs ...
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Health impacts of the Sure Start programme on disadvantaged ...
In the UK, Sure Start is an early-years intervention programme established in 1999: a flagship policy of the 1997–2010 government. Sure Start, in the form of ...<|separator|>
[52]
A community health needs evaluation: improving uptake of services ...
Mar 1, 2008 · A community health needs evaluation: improving uptake of services at a children's centre in a deprived and geographically isolated town.
[53]
Children's centre use falls by 18% in most deprived areas
Jun 18, 2019 · In the most deprived areas, the decrease was more pronounced with 22% fewer children accessing the centres in these areas, compared to a 12% ...
[54]
Family Hubs: an interim review - The Centre for Social Justice
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Sure Start's wide-ranging and long-lasting benefits highlight ... - IFS
May 22, 2025 · It improved educational outcomes and health, and reduced school absences and less severe special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Sure ...
[56]
Sure Start generated long-term benefits finds study
May 28, 2025 · Children who lived within 2.5km of a Sure Start centre early in life were around one percentage point more likely to achieve five good GCSEs ...
[57]
Sure Start greatly improved disadvantaged children's GCSE results
Apr 9, 2024 · Children eligible for free school meals living near a Sure Start centre increased their performance at GCSE by three grades relative to ...
[58]
The short- and medium-term impacts of Sure Start on educational ...
Apr 9, 2024 · Introduced in 1999, Sure Start was the first large government initiative to provide holistic support to families with children under the age of ...
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At their peak, Sure Start centres prevented ... - Nuffield Foundation
Aug 16, 2021 · By age 15, an extra Sure Start centre per thousand children during childhood prevents over 3,000 hospitalisations a year among boys, but has ...Missing: absences | Show results with:absences
[60]
Sure Start programme saved the NHS millions of pounds, study finds
Jun 3, 2019 · Sure Start children's centres delivered major health benefits for youngsters in the most deprived areas, reducing the number of people taken to hospital.
[61]
From Sure Start to youth centres, cutting children's services is a false ...
Nov 24, 2024 · Research reveals that Tessa Jowell's programme not only helped early years children but went on to reduce youth crime.
[62]
The Guardian view on Sure Start's legacy: investing in children ...
Oct 24, 2024 · Its latest report reveals that Sure Start areas had 20% fewer children who served a custodial sentence by age 16. While this is among the ...
[63]
Sure Start centres generated £2 of financial benefits for every £1 ...
May 22, 2025 · At its peak in 2009-10 Sure Start had 3,600 centres in England, before austerity cuts reduced government funding by two-thirds, with local ...
[64]
[PDF] The impact of Sure Start Local Programmes on seven year olds and ...
The children in SSLP areas were found to have low cognitive and language development at three years of age, being on average roughly one standard deviation.
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[PDF] The health impacts of Sure Start - IFS
In this briefing note (and the accompanying working paper), we extend the evidence from our 2019 report to show how Sure Start has influenced children's health.
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[PDF] Evaluation of Children's Centres in England (ECCE) Strand 3
Choice for Parents, the Best Start for Children: A Ten Year. Childcare Strategy. Norwich: HMSO. Incredible Years. (2012). Incredible Years Series Overview ...
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[PDF] National Evaluation of Sure Start local programmes: An economic ...
This amounts to an average lifetime economic benefit to society of between £279 and £557 per eligible child. Two-thirds of the economic benefit is received by ...
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Sure Start numbers plummet as cuts hit children's services | Welfare
Jun 17, 2019 · Local authority spending cuts have driven a 20% fall in the number of youngsters using Sure Start children's centres in just four years.
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England's Sure Start Pre-School Child Care Centres: Public Policy ...
They were initiated by the New Labour government in the late 1990s, and evolved in various ways as Sure Start centres, and Early Childhood Care Centres.Missing: adaptation | Show results with:adaptation<|control11|><|separator|>
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Austerity cuts are eroding benefits of Sure Start children's centres
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Labour vows to protect Sure Start-type system from any future ...
Jul 7, 2025 · But much of Sure Start was dismantled amid massive spending cuts by the Conservatives. The new policy of family hubs will commit £500m to ...
[72]
Giving every child the best start in life - House of Commons Library
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[73]
Family hubs to open in every council in England - BBC
Jul 6, 2025 · The idea of a family hub dates back to the early 2000s when New Labour introduced "Sure Start" centres - focused on supporting young families ...<|separator|>
[74]
One-stop family hubs to be opened in all English council areas
Jul 5, 2025 · The £500m project will open up to 1,000 centres from April 2026, meaning every council in England will have a family hub by 2028. It will build ...
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Educational Impacts and Cost-Effectiveness of Conditional Cash ...
We meta-analyze for impact and cost-effectiveness 94 studies from 47 conditional cash transfer programs in low- and middle-income countries worldwide.
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Getting a healthy start: The effectiveness of targeted benefits for ...
Our contribution in this paper is to study the impact of the UK Healthy Start scheme, a large-scale, nationally-implemented scheme that distributes vouchers ...
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The cost-effectiveness of a cash-based transfer, specialised ...
Nov 22, 2024 · In comparison to food aids, evidence suggests that cash transfers appear to be more cost-effective in improving nutritional outcomes [22–24].
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Giving every child the best start in life - GOV.UK
Jul 7, 2025 · 'Giving every child the best start in life' outlines how the government will improve child development and ensure that all children have the chance to achieve ...
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Giving every child the best start in life | Local Government Association
July 2025 – The Government set out the Giving Every Child the Best Start in Life Strategy, which committed to rolling out Family Hubs to all local authorities ...
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https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2025-07-07/debates/FBE1743B-9B94-4B66-B478-C6C9DCD5CC3B/GivingEveryChildtheBestStartInLife
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Government announces £500m to develop Family Hubs in every ...
Jul 9, 2025 · Government announces £500m to develop Family Hubs in every Local Authority in England. Posted 9th July 2025. The Family Hubs Network was very ...
[82]
A response to the government's Best Start in Life strategy - IFS
Jul 8, 2025 · The government has set itself a target to have 75% of five-year-olds reaching a good level of development by 2028.Missing: ongoing evaluations
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[PDF] Early Years Stronger Practice Hubs Evaluation - GOV.UK
Jun 23, 2025 · Suitability, of the Hub model as a way of supporting the early years sector, namely a model that is peer-led, responsive, and inclusive of ...
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National Evaluation of Start for Life - Anna Freud
It helps meet commitments in The best start for life: a vision for the 1,001 critical days, published as government policy in March 2021. The programme's ...
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Building on a decade of A Better Start
Aug 1, 2025 · ABS evidence has also influenced the government's Opportunity Mission, and in particular the Best Start in Life pillar. As I write this, the ...
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Introduction - Five Family Payments: evaluation - gov.scot
Sep 4, 2025 · Best Start Grant is designed to reduce financial pressures on low income families at key transition points in their children's lives. It is made ...<|separator|>
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Best Start Grant: interim evaluation - gov.scot
Dec 15, 2020 · Impact of the Best Start Grant. The consensus among respondents was that the BSG had a very positive impact on their household finances. It was ...