Memorandum submitted by Pre-school Learning Alliance

How models of Children's Centres have developed as the programme spreads from the most deprived areas

In phase 1 Children's Centres were based in large, mostly purpose-designed buildings which incorporated childcare facilities. Phase two and three centres have been developed in a variety of buildings; for example, we use a number of small, purpose-built modular buildings which have an office, a meeting room and a kitchen.

We also run centres in premises that have been refurbished, in one case a space in the local library or school. We have a phase three centre in a shared community office next to the school where the parish clerk also has a desk. We have designated centres without a building with the manager working from a base in the school or health centre while premises were being built or negotiated.

This approach has the advantage of placing the children's centre in the community. In more rural areas, the children's centre is a "virtual portal" - an office providing information - whilst the services are taken out to locations within villages.

The siting of children's centres is the responsibility of local authorities and they are not always in the right place - the decisions are often made on the basis of available space rather than on accessibility, particularly to hard-to-reach groups.

The range and effectiveness of services provided by Children's Centres

Most centres provide stay and play type sessions to encourage parents to become involved in the centre; they are often messy play sessions run by a staff member, also singing and music groups of various types. The purpose of the groups is to encourage play between parent and child and to give ideas and suggestions for play at home. Parents usually have a good time and even if the activities aren't always repeated in the home, the time spent together in the session is beneficial to the child.

Other activities encourage mothers to exercise while pushing a buggy and link into the healthy lifestyle agenda. Cooking healthy meals is high on staff agendas but not always successful in attracting parents. The exercise classes are popular and encourage parents to enjoy being outdoors and see exercise as a fun activity that can be incorporated into everyday activity.

Parenting activities such as courses or workshops on behaviour are in place to support parents to develop their knowledge of child development and learning and give strategies for managing behaviour. Parents who take part in these sessions feel they have gained confidence in parenting and would deal with their child's behaviour differently.

Job centre plus boards advertising vacancies are often in centres with contact details of their local job centre. In some centres initial assessment interviews take place within the centre as some parents have to travel with small children to reach their nearest office. Benefit advice leaflets and information are available from centres and in one a warm phone with direct dial to benefit advice is available as is touch screen outlets giving information on local services. It's clear that many parents aren't aware of things like working families tax credit or what is available locally in terms of training opportunities. Links with colleges to provide literacy and numeracy support are piecemeal.

One to one sessions with a psychiatric nurse for mothers with depression are available in one centre. Help with smoking cessation is available through leaflets and groups where possible. Smoking cessation doesn't seem to have major success; some parents are successful but many aren't interested in stopping.

Activities for dads have varying success; some Saturday morning breakfast events are well attended as are activity sessions like football. There seems little evidence of dads becoming involved in the child development and behaviour type sessions although staff try to weave messages about these elements through the activities they provide.

The key issue remains the effectiveness of these services in drawing in hard-to-reach groups. Whatever the type of area there are real issues of isolation, mental illness, addiction and domestic violence which make it difficult for families to be organised enough to attend these fixed time activities.

Funding, sustainability and value for money

Funding for centres is different in each local authority area, usually decided by post code area, reach area and factors like rurality. The funding is usually to cover a core staff team of manager, admin, and outreach/play and learning workers depending on the reach or phase of the centre, and this accounts for the largest spend. Staff salaries are usually fairly high in comparison to other early years workers, so recruitment is not usually an issue.

The pressure on funding particularly in phase one areas is usually around the delivery of childcare in the day care nursery which is provided as part of the 'core offer'. Families unable to pay daycare costs look for fee support and childcare settings look for sustainability. Money is not usually available to support the sustainability of the daycare but should be used to support a place for a child/parent in need. Criteria for the use of this support funding often means that this is a short term solution and can result in parent debt once this support is finished.

The 'full day care model' for childcare seldom works as a business model in the areas of disadvantage that the phase one children's centres deliver their services. This is one of the key factors behind the relatively low numbers of private and voluntary sector organisations delivering childcare when compared with other areas of the country outside the 30% most deprived as defined by the Index of Multiple Deprivation. According to the 'DCSF Childcare and Early Years Provider Survey 2008', 83% of all day care nursery income in England is generated by fees, and just 17% (£42k on average per nursery) from local authority/government sources, whereas, day care nursery income in children's centres is made up 46% from fees and 53% (at an average of £181k per children's centre) from local authority funding.

The average figure of £181k of childcare support in children's centres is far from being a universal figure. The Pre-school Learning Alliance, amongst other private and voluntary sector providers, operate and manage a number of children's centre nurseries and usually is in receipt of something less than a third of this figure - in the form of nursery education funding. The potential - and sometimes real - impact of this is that the most needy children and families are unable to take up extended periods of childcare beyond the 'free entitlement' to nursery education funding in these settings compared to local authority-run settings.

Staffing, governance, management and strategic planning

Staffing centres with qualified managers is difficult, the salary attracts a wide range of people but skills are variable. The NPQICL is often a course that managers go on when they already employed and although access to a course is now easier it isn't a course people do before employment. Qualifications are often early years based, or health and social care professionals. The skills set needed by staff are easy to define but access to training for those skills is not always easy to find.

Governance groups are variable in success; within some county and borough areas the pressure on some professionals is high and they are unable to be part of advisory boards in all centres. Timing of meetings can be difficult as parents are often unable to attend during the day and professionals often don't want evening meetings. The group, if it is made up of local people, can give a good insight into the area and the impact of the centre on that area.

How well Children's Centres work with other partners and services, especially schools and health services

Building links with health teams has been piecemeal with some counties having more success in securing involvement. Attendance at meetings and representation on advisory boards has been a struggle. Health Visitors have seen the centres as a support referring families to the childcare in phase one centres but there is little evidence of the links to ensure early intervention. Baby massage groups and pre and post natal sessions are run in some centres by health visitors, but other centres struggle to get that level of involvement; in one centre we send a member of staff to the health clinic to talk to parents and provide an activity for children while they are waiting for appointments at the baby clinic. Health visitors are key persons in identifying families needing support and have a good grasp of the issues for families with small children in their area. Some centres have an agreement that Health Visitors will give their details to new parents as the centre is unable to obtain direct information on families from the Health Visitor. Identifying families in need of outreach support can therefore be difficult.

Schools are also variable in their support for centres; some head teachers are part of boards and they are often willing to have centre information and posters within the school. The difficulty is often sharing information on families - as with Health Visitors - as schools can be reluctant to share information. Where a common assessment is in place this is obviously less of an issue, but information before the common assessment framework has been used can be hard to access.

Whether services are being accessed by those most in need and how effectively they are for the most valuable

This group of people are the most difficult to target with services. Initially finding information on families in need of targeted support from other agencies is not easy. Staff in centres try a variety of other methods to encourage families into the centre, giving out leaflets in the street or standing outside supermarkets, placing posters of events in prominent places. However, for many vulnerable families walking into a centre is difficult and requires a level of trust. Families with drug and alcohol problems or domestic violence, etc, may see the centre as social workers in another guise and have concerns that people may find out things the family doesn't want to share which may result in children being taken away, always the biggest fear of families in difficulty. These families may have poor experience of the education system which will make accessing services based in schools offputting - it is unlikely that people will use services in buildings that they associated with failure and criticism.

Vulnerable families can pose a difficulty for staff whose aim is to bring them into services; a stay and play session, however open and welcoming, requires certain social skills and parents who have difficulty with their relationship with their child and problems with parenting skills can easily feel under pressure in this type of situation. Parents under the influence of drugs and/or alcohol are not in a position to play in the sand or with the paint. Depression and neglect from domestic violence can leave mothers unable to take advantage of activities available for training and learning. The safeguarding and child protection policies for staff mean they have a duty to report concerns but this may be the very thing that prevents families from attending.

For centres to be successful in addressing issues for those most in need and vulnerable families, more work needs to be done on initial contact with families. More liaison is needed between agencies - despite guidance the initial support for identifying children and families and providing support is piecemeal. Staff in centres are struggling to find vulnerable families and when they do are faced with the difficulty of working with the family, gaining their trust and starting Common Assessment Framework processes where needed.

October 2009