Article For Folkestone Herald and Kentish Express

27 June 2005

Last Friday began with a meeting with a number of managers of early years provision – nursery education to you and me!

They have many concerns and it was a very useful meeting. There has been a welcome increase in this provision but there have also been difficulties. The funding regime has often meant that parents have been asked to top up the cost met by taxpayers and this has frequently been difficult to budget for. One of those present at the meeting lamented the end of the voucher system set up by the previous Government and one of the main concerns related to the inflexibility of the present system.

There are few, if any, more important things than giving our children the best possible start in life. It is obviously right that Government and taxpayers should recognise their responsibility to help arrange this. But a one-size-fits-all approach does not reflect the enormously varied circumstances in which today’s families find themselves. So flexibility should be seen as the key to success in these areas – as it is in so many others.

Next stop was a meeting with Sue Hunt the new Chief Executive of the East Kent NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust. 

We discussed a particularly difficult case which I have been dealing with and also more general problems affecting mental health – for so long the Cinderella of the NHS.

Then the high point of my day – the 10th Anniversary of Shepway HomeStart, I have sung the praises of HomeStart on many occasions in these columns. The work it does in helping families with small children is quite superb – all the more so because the help it provides by volunteers who have been through all the problems of raising families themselves.

I was present at the launch 10 years ago and delighted to be able to say a few words on the 10th Anniversary. Lynda Burchett and her team have done a wonderful job and I hope the next 10 years are equally successful.

On Sunday I was present at the opening of the new courts at Hythe Lawn Tennis Club. The club has been busy recruiting and training junior players. The new facilities are excellent. Let’s all hope that the next Andrew Murphy comes from Shepway!