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Contemporary preventative services, coalitions and the Conservatives

In this chapter we explore contemporary children’s services, discussing how the persuasive logic of prevention has been adopted in more modern service delivery. Focusing specifically on the early 2010s, we map the shift from the Conservative flagship project of the Big Society, to the renewed localism project of the Civil Society Strategy. The links between the societal hardening of focus, from universal provision to the targeting of preventative services will be delineated, and the role of the voluntary sector in the delivery of these services will be discussed. The aim is to highlight the lived realities of service delivery for children, which will then be discussed over the remainder of this book.

The Big Society to civil society

The Big Society was promoted by the Conservative government as a solution to the financial crisis which had gripped the UK and much of Europe since 2008. In 2009, David Cameron initially outlined the Conservative’s vision for the ‘Big Society’ in his Hugo Young Memorial Lecture, controversially presenting Labour as ‘big government’ but still following themes that resonated with the ‘third way’. At that time, Cameron suggested: ‘Because we believe that a strong society will solve our problems more effectively than big government has or ever will, we want the state to act as an instrument for helping to create a strong society … Our alternative to big government is the Big Society’ (Cameron, 2009).

The concept of the Big Society remained confusing. It was an integral part of the Conservative/Liberal Democrats Coalition’s plans, on their election in 2010, for public sector service provision retraction and emphasised the voluntary sector and ‘civil society’ delivering public services in a more cost-efficient manner during an economic downturn. For the Conservatives, the Big Society focused on providing answers to the central problems that they argued faced Britain under Labour rule. Citing the financial crisis, decreases in employment and increases in poverty, they argued that Britain was ‘broken’ financially, socially and politically (Evans, 2011). The concept of the Big Society suggested that by supporting civil action and community spirit, the Big Society could mend Britain socially. By finding cheaper alternatives in the delivery of services in the public sector and helping the unemployed back to work the Big Society could mend Britain financially. Finally, by empowering the voters to hold those in power to account, the Big Society could mend Britain politically (Evans, 2011).

The Coalition was keen to demonstrate that the Big Society was a shift away from the previous government’s concept of the third sector. This was highlighted by a change in language, dropping the rather condescending term ‘third sector’ as Cameron (2009) referred to it and adopting an ideologically driven narrative that discussed the voluntary sector as the ‘first sector’ and more commonly ‘civil society’. Following this the Office for Third Sector was quickly renamed the ‘Office for Civil Society’ (OCS). Though retained in the Cabinet Office its primary functions were to enable voluntary sector organisations to work with the state, allowing the free flow of resources to the sector and make the management of these organisations easier. Some new forms of funding emerged including the establishment of the Big Society Bank and Social Impact Bonds. However, the 2010 public spending review triggered a number of major spending cuts that would directly affect the voluntary sector. For example, the OCS had its budget cut by 60%, the loss of quangos such as Capacitybuilders and the Commission for Compact; horizontal funding programmes developed by Labour such as Futurebuilders, the Social Enterprise Investment fund and Change up came to an end and there was a significant cut in support for strategic infrastructure partners. Prior to feeling the impact of the public spending review, the voluntary sector had already experienced £118 million worth of cuts in funding from local authorities in England between May and September of 2010 alone, with many more following (Alcock et al, 2012). The voluntary sector was being simultaneously encouraged to tender to deliver services on behalf of local authorities and the government, while being warned about being too ‘dependent’ upon government funding and therefore at risk in an economic downturn (Evans, 2011). According to the NCVO Almanac (2014) between 2010/11 and 2011/12 the total funding allocated by government to the voluntary sector fell by 8.8% in real terms. This was a funding reduction of £1.3 billion, in which social services organisations, and education and training organisations saw the largest reductions of £361 million and £230 million respectively. Health organisations experienced a slightly smaller loss and only international organisations saw a slight overall increase.

Arguably used to differentiate the public spending cutbacks from those of the 1980s (Bach, 2012), the term ‘Big Society’ has appeared at times to attempt to become all-encompassing, to represent both public spending cuts and to commission ineffectively run public services out to voluntary sector providers and social enterprises. The rhetoric surrounding the Big Society has been used to ‘soften’ an otherwise harsh image of the Conservative party (Albrow, 2012), communicating to a wider audience and attempting to show an empathetic and understanding Conservative party. Within this, there was the suggestion of rebuilding civic duty and voluntary action to fill in any voids. However, there was no single definition or shared understanding of the term ‘Big Society’. Indeed, the House of Commons Public Administration Select Committee (PASC, 2011) highlighted lack of understanding surrounding the concept of Big Society and furthermore drew attention to the potential negative impacts for the voluntary sector including loss of sector independence. Furthermore, the committee drew attention to the questionable nature of the voluntary sector being the ‘cheaper’ alternative (PASC, 2011). In contrast to this, due to the vagueness surrounding the Big Society, many commentators dismissed the concept as little other than a ‘smokescreen’ for continual and unrelenting cuts and privatisation of public services (Sage, 2012; Whitfield, 2012). Bach (2012) argues that the government has attempted to distance the concept of Big Society from numerous austerity measures since the comprehensive spending review in 2012. However, when almost three quarters of the reduction to the deficit were set to come from reductions in public spending it is difficult to separate the two. Though these austerity measures have had significant impact on the workforce and services of the public sector, our interest in the concept of Big Society turns to one of examining the impact on the voluntary sector.

During the May 2010 general elections, in the Conservatives’ manifesto, the policy agenda of Big Society had three main themes, ‘community empowerment’, ‘opening up public services’ and ‘social action’. These translated respectively into localism and decentralisation of power to local communities; public services reform where public services would be commissioned out to charities and private sector business; and programmes to engage individuals as active citizens within their communities, for example the National Citizen Service for 16-year-olds (Macmillan, 2013a). The concept of Big Society has however had a problematic start with what appear to be several re-launches (Macmillan, 2013b) and ongoing critical commentary and academic analysis, despite the decline of policy statements and speeches within which it features (Sage, 2012; Scott, 2011). However, it is possible to extract some of the government’s intentions through these policy strands. First, the emphasis upon localism and decentralisation focused on the enhancement of the role of the local community. Bach argues that though localism is an ‘innocuous term’ the intent is ‘to encourage competition and choice’ (Bach, 2012: 404) at a local, service provision level. Not only is this opposed to the authority of locally elected local authorities, the Localism Bill (now the Localism Act) went further to suggest and encourage voluntary sector organisations and local communities to oppose and challenge existing service provision, and to tender to manage and deliver the services themselves. The government was explicit about this within the guidance on the Localism Bill which aims to ‘identify and tackle public sector monopolies across the board … all public services should be open to diverse provision’ (HM Government, 2011: 9). The second policy strand focused upon the provision of public services delivered by a diverse range of organisations. In particular, social enterprises, mutuals, cooperatives and charities were encouraged to expand within this area. The ‘Right to Provide’ initiative which aims to ‘unleash the power of employee ownership and control’ had a slow take up (Bach, 2012). The third strand of the policy development couples the intent to increase volunteerism among individuals and communities, with the increasing role of the voluntary sector. The provision of funding was intended to help resolve the funding deficits due to the economic downturn and local authority cuts. Underpinning this, the Coalition aimed to train and up-skill 5000 ‘community organisers’ to facilitate local community action to tackle local and larger social issues. The question arises, was this the Coalition’s way of empowering communities, or abdicating responsibility? Critics argue (for example, Bach, 2012) that these three policy strands have been underpinned by few actual initiatives but rather have been used ‘to weave together disparate policies and its imprecision may serve to disguise the extent of marketization and service withdrawal associated with the Coalition’s public service agenda’ (Bach, 2012: 404).

By 2012 the term ‘Big Society’ was fading fast from the public realm, more commonly replaced by terms such as ‘civil society’. This was epitomised further by the publication of the government’s Civil Society Strategy in 2018. With debates about Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union in full swing and divisions within civil society on the rise, it is unsurprising that the government launched a strategy which called for unity and support among communities. The strategy itself was an important step, as it delivered a uniting thread across government departments about the importance of civil society in both tackling contemporary problems and developing innovative solutions. The central tenet of the strategy is that communities can be helped to thrive, through the strengthening of ‘five foundations of social value’, people, places, the social sector, the private sector and the public sector.

The first theme, people, seeks to encourage individuals to have more control over their futures and communities, and to support them in taking action on issues which they care about. This taps into established programmes such as the national #iwill campaign, which encourages young people to volunteer, and place-based social action programmes, which encourages local responses to local needs. Fundamentally, the government wants more people who use public services involved in running those services. The second theme, places, seeks to encourage communities to be responsible for where they live. As part of this the government launched a new ‘Innovation in Democracy’ programme, to encourage new ways of individuals being involved in decision making which affects them. The third theme, the social sector, focuses on ensuring that voluntary organisations have impact on and help shape policy. The fourth theme, the private sector, seeks to encourage businesses to be socially and environmentally responsible. Finally, the fifth theme, the public sector, outlines a commitment to more collaborative commissioning processes. While not entirely new, more a re-hash of previous promises, commitments and dedicated funding, the strategy distinctly builds on the ideology set out in the earlier Conservative plans, around the Big Society and localism. However, it is a vision of sorts, but without the detail of how longer-term issues around funding, commissioning and reducing public sector funds are to be addressed, and it is likely to face some of the very same criticisms levelled at the Big Society.

Conservatives, children and early intervention

In 2010 with the establishment of the Coalition government came a range of structural and policy changes for children’s services. Arguing that the Children’s Trust Boards (see chapter 1) were over prescriptive, statutory guidance on these boards was withdrawn in 2010, meaning that there was no longer a statutory requirement for local authorities to produce a Children and Young People’s Plan (LGA, 2010). The requirement of a Children’s Trust Board was then removed altogether. Further changes followed, including the withdrawal of the ContactPoint database in 2010, the national Children’s Workforce Development Council was wound up in 2012 and Ofsted’s powers and functions were reviewed. However, the Coalition made some concrete attempts in committing to meet the needs of what it defined as ‘vulnerable’ children and young people, promoting a mixed welfare economy of statutory, voluntary and private sector providers. In 2010 the Coalition government commissioned the high profile and influential Munro Report (Munro, 2011) which argued for early intervention ‘to avoid costly interventions’ (Munro, 2011: 22). Echoing Allen’s (2011a) desire for ‘evidence-based practice’, Munro (2011) advocated for a more child centred approach to child protection and a focus on partnership working. Alongside this in 2012 the Institute for Public Policy Research published ‘A long division: Closing the attainment gap in England’s secondary schools’ (Clifton and Cook, 2012). This paper argued heavily in favour of early intervention provision, suggesting that unless children started school on a ‘level playing field’, schools and academies could not close the attainment gaps between the rich and poor. This paper echoed Allen’s (2011a) first Early Intervention publication in that it placed a heavy emphasis on ‘school and life readiness’. In February 2013, the Department for Education and the Early Intervention Foundation consortium agreed funding and signed a contract to create a new and independent Early Intervention Foundation (EIF), which was launched in April 2013, and became an independent charity in July 2013. They applied the following definition to early intervention:

Early Intervention is about addressing the root causes of social disadvantage, ensuring that everyone is able to realise their full potential by developing the range of skills we all need to thrive. It is about getting extra, effective and timely interventions to all babies, children and young people who need them, allowing them to flourish and preventing harmful and costly long-term consequences. (EIF, 2013)

This definition resonates strongly with Labour’s definition of social exclusion, as do the solutions focusing on a model of social investment. However, this definition places greater emphasis upon early intervention in terms of both risk factors and age of children. The Munro Report (Munro, 2011), highlighted the term ‘early help’ as a positive replacement for the term ‘early intervention’. Munro (2011) identified this as a term that suggested a working together of professional services and families, rather than professional services intervening and ‘doing to’ families as implied by early intervention. Considered as a more positive and progressive term than ‘early intervention’ (Frost et al, 2015), early help is defined as ‘an ambiguous term, referring both to help in the early years of a child or young person’s life and early in the emergence of any stage in their lives’ (Munro, 2011: 69). What is important here is that Munro argued that early help was a societal ‘moral imperative’ (Munro, 2011) to minimise suffering and would help achieve cost savings by preventing problems rather than trying to reverse damage later on in individuals’ lives. What is important is that the Munro Report reinforced the role of the voluntary sector, suggesting that engagement of families was central to their work.

In a period of economic decline, however, long-term preventative services moved down the list of priorities in favour of more targeted intervention. For example, through continued commitment to early intervention, Waldegrave (2013) highlighted the fact that children’s centres, a statutory provision to provide universal and early support to families, experienced on average a 28% decrease in their funding between 2010 and 2012, with more significant cuts to follow. Indeed by 2018, over 1,000 children’s centres had closed because of funding shortages.

Funding cuts inevitably result in fewer services and a more targeted approach being adopted (Waldegrave, 2013). The ideological notion that the voluntary sector will be able to attract other funding to achieve this then becomes increasingly important. To put this risk into perspective, in 2015 the National Children’s Bureau reported an overall 55% reduction in early intervention funding under the Coalition government (2010–2015), which equates to cuts of £1.8 billion per year. By 2018, this funding slump had deepened, with figures from the National Audit Office showing a £763 million slump in funding for children and family support since the Coalition government was first elected in 2010, while funding for services for young people has fallen by £855 million. Alongside this, according to the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) (2018), since 2010 schools have experienced an 8% decline per pupil funding, coupled with rising costs.

The assumption that the voluntary and private sectors could replace this funding was crucial to the success of the Big Society and the subsequent Civil Society strategy. Indeed, despite widespread protest, the current Conservative government insisted that no more funding was available for children and education services. Therefore, the voluntary sector becomes a critical partner in its assumed ability to attract, recruit and retain volunteers over that of public and private sector organisations. Coote (2011) argues that this key premise, that voluntary organisations can replace paid labour with unpaid labour through voluntarism, is fundamentally flawed. Furthermore, the assumption that withdrawal of state funding from voluntary organisations will be replaced by philanthropy, donations and voluntarism action is unproven (Albrow, 2012). Additionally, this risks the exploitation of the fundamental concept of voluntary action which is the giving of one’s skills, money and time as a gift and risked reinvigorating a postcode lottery, as areas within which people have the time and means to ‘gift’ do not correspond areas of ‘need’ (Evans, 2011).

The evolving discourse of prevention

Considering the challenges posed by the ongoing political shifts about who should support vulnerable groups in society, the discourse of prevention has also experienced changes. Though welcomed overall across children’s services, Labour’s recognition and definition of social exclusion and thus their concern with child poverty has been widely debated. Labour clearly located the concept of prevention within the context of social exclusion. With this came the conceptualisation of children deemed to be ‘at risk’ and factors associated with the ‘at risk’ child. Labour started from the premise of concern for all children and young people’s wellbeing. The repeated emphasis within this framework was upon children who were considered to be particularly at risk of social exclusion and poor outcomes. Morris et al (2008) suggested ‘these children are seen to present real challenges to the political aspirations for socially and economically viable citizens, and as such, additional interventions have been proposed as necessary to ensure that the investment in childhood does deliver later benefits’ (p 30). This social investment model requires early intervention in order to prevent future burdens on the state constructs children as future ‘investments’. Critics of this approach (for example, Prout, 2000; Lister, 2003) have suggested that the model adopted by Labour focused too much on a model of social investment, constructing children as an investment for our future. Rather than focusing upon tackling inequality and redistribution of wealth and opportunity, a social investment model focuses upon a political version of social inclusion and draws upon education as the means and vehicle into future employability. Such an approach not only suggests the perceived inter-changeability between social exclusion and poverty but also, as critics argue (for example, Fawcett et al, 2004), neglects the wellbeing of a child. Perversely, by targeting groups identified as at risk, children may suffer from stigmatisation that could heighten their risk of social exclusion in the future (Fawcett et al, 2004).

Interpretation of the discourse surrounding the issue of ‘risk’ presents several challenging concepts that are not helpful to the development of a child. Therefore, many academics and practitioners favour the concept of ‘resilience’ as a term that focuses more directly on the wellbeing of the child and the development of skills and attributes that help them cope with difficult circumstances. Broadly speaking, the concept of resilience focuses on an on-going process between the individual and the social context within which they exist (Howard et al, 1999). Defined by Fonagy et al (1994) as ‘normal development under difficult circumstances’ (p 233), resilience stresses the importance of the relationship between the child and their family, and the child’s ability to engage with protective factors, with their family’s support, to offset the risks. Throughout the Labour term there was a growing pool of evidence that suggested the importance of focusing upon the resilience of the community or family, as well as the individual (Mackey, 2003). For example, Gilligan (1999) highlighted the role of communities and peer groups in providing children with social support networks, helping to establish resilience factors. Therefore, Labour’s focus on child welfare policy, social exclusion and resilience led to a framework of interventions that aimed to take a more holistic approach. Communities and service providers aimed to provide community-based interventions, which were integrated and involved children, young people and their families in a participative approach (Evans and Pinnock, 2007). The ‘risk, resilience and protection-focused prevention paradigm’ (France and Utting, 2005) therefore became a key feature of the national Children’s Fund programme, although the long-term benefits of such interventions remain unclear (Evans et al, 2006; Frost et al, 2015).

The shift in the notion of prevention from the risk of being significantly harmed, to the risk of being socially excluded saw the rise of several new policy discourses. Prior to this prevention was more commonly used in the context of preventing harm within the fora of child protection. As Little et al (2003) identified, this more commonly referred to the avoidance of a child maltreatment. The launch of Every Child Matters (DfES, 2003) and the subsequent, Every Child Matters: Change for Children (DfES, 2004) saw a significant shift in the conceptualisation of ‘at risk’. This new articulation of ‘at risk’ was more likely to focus upon children and young people experiencing poor outcomes through poor educational attainment, lower social participation, demonstrating poor health or anti-social behaviours (Morris et al, 2009). This suggests that the social construction of the term ‘at risk’ determines children as vulnerable or at risk whose circumstances are not in keeping with the dominant middle class in either culture, values, family, structures, language or appearance (Howard et al, 1999). Risk factors, however, continuously remain difficult to identify with little consensus about what measurements to use, and a continued lack of evidence about causal links between identified risk factors and the future outcomes of the child (Hansen and Plewis, 2004). The core focus of children within preventative type services prior to the Every Child Matters agenda tended to be, for example, those who were in the care system or considered disabled. The Every Child Matters agenda fundamentally changed the discourse of prevention to one that was concerned with the needs of all children, introducing a new conceptual framework for risk. For those working with children and young people this presented ‘a series of tensions between historical responsibilities for children who may suffer significant harm, and new experiences for holistic responses to children and young people’ (Morris et al, 2009: 33).

The construction of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ parenting within the prevention discourse is equally as important. With the introduction of initiatives such as Sure Start, which partly focused on parenting and thereby positively influencing children’s trajectories from a young age, and the National Academy for Parenting Practitioners, highlighting the preference for shared and pooled knowledge about good parenting, there was a clear aim of establishing and enforcing a political version of good parenting norms and values. Gillies (2005) suggested that this removed the discussions of parenting away from societal cause, such as poverty or social injustice, and instead focused upon individual engagement. Gillies (2005) argues that this is a change in preventative discourse, seeing those ‘at risk’ as both perpetrators and victims of their own exclusion, further arguing that in the context of parenting and families the path to social inclusion reflects middle-class values and culture. As a result, those parents not demonstrating politically approved parenting approaches require ‘parenting support’ and new legal and punitive powers that aimed to ‘punish’ parents who failed to deliver to these standards. Walters and Woodward (2007) suggests that this shift in discourse has seen the ‘needs’ of parents of vulnerable children moved aside while their ‘responsibilities’ become the dominant feature. Morris et al’s (2008) literature review of ‘whole family approaches’ which sought to help overcome or prevent social exclusion revealed an almost one-dimensional focus on parenting activities, mainly focused on the mother and her role in securing positive outcomes for her children. When translated at a policy level this focus reflects the political concern of social exclusion transferring through generations, with children replicating behaviours of their socially excluded parents.

As the Labour term evolved, the notion of targeting families and particularly those families considered to be most at risk of social exclusion increased (Morris and Barnes, 2008). The idea of the ‘normal’ family dominated the social policy discourse (France et al, 2010). The imagery of the hard working, socially participative and economically active family arguably reinforced and maintained marginalisation of those ‘other’ families who failed to conform (Morris et al, 2009). Though Labour heavily focused on these families, as Levitas (2005) noted, there was little data gathered from these families to support such assumptions. With families highlighted as a key concern in Every Child Matters and subsequent initiatives, there was a shift in focus to those families perceived as being the ‘most disruptive’. This focus provided the backdrop for publications such as the ‘Think Family’ series from the SEU (Morris et al, 2008) and marked a shift in discourse from the more holistic approach outlined in Every Child Matters, to a vastly interventionist approach which required ‘forceful sanctions’ to ensure compliance and a return to social acceptability (Morris et al, 2009). Underpinned by the ‘Respect’ agenda highlighting the need for intensive family intervention programmes, there was a focus on tackling poor parenting and the provision of positive activities for vulnerable children and young people. Therefore, the trajectory of prevention discourse appeared to be moving away from holistic service provision for the wellbeing of children and towards providing ‘treatment’ for the socially unacceptable.

Within this discourse of prevention, under Labour there was a move away from the concept of social exclusion and addressing the consequences of the wider societal problem, towards that of addressing individual problematic families. This gave room for the Social Exclusion Task Force to drive forward the Family Pathfinder pilots (Cabinet Office, 2008), targeting these families through multi-agency responses, and thus a greater distinction between mainstream or universal services, and targeted services emerged. Some critics have argued that this shift in discourse poses a greater threat to these ‘hard to reach families’. The lack of focus on the structural and cultural context surrounding these families has, some argue, led to ‘defeated’ families (Krumer-Nevo, 2003). Defeated families are those who have been marginalised by society due to economic, social and cultural forces and then let down by the services which have tried to serve them through intensive interventions which have only had partial impact, resulting in these families continuing to experience social and economic deprivation. In short, between 1997 and 2010, the policy discourse around prevention experienced a specific shift from the concepts of social exclusion and the need to promote social inclusion, to those of social investment and economic decision making, where decisions focused on the greatest investment would have the greatest impact. Though it is clear that the concept of social investment was entrenched in the preventative discourse of the ‘third way’ (Giddens, 1998) its significance and status only increased over Labour’s time in power.

This concept of social investment was further developed by the Conservatives, based on the foundational ideas of Labour’s ‘third way’, which advocated active citizenship and community participation within the concept of Cameron’s ‘Big Society’. The Big Society ideology was based upon the notion of communities and families taking responsibility for themselves, for the overall benefit of society. In his examination of the social investment model, Gray (2013) observes that while social inclusion, rather than exclusion, still exists as a concept within preventative services it has shifted away from the previous rhetoric of social and community participation to one of economic participation through the act of work, or seeking to work. Jenson (2010) suggested that the concept of social investment which was beginning to dominate prevention discourse saw a shift from the idea of ‘protecting’ families and children from harm, to making people more integrated within society and eliminate those who remain dependent upon welfare. This notion was heavily based upon the concept of establishing and increasing human and social capital enabling people to become fully integrated and contribute to society. As Gray states, ‘founded on psychological research on human cognitive and personality development, social investment moves the focus of social policy away from remedial welfare to early childhood education and care’ (2013: 2). Continuing in a similar rhetoric to where the Labour party left off, investing in children as future socioeconomic actors and investing in the concept of the good parent remained at the forefront of preventative policy discourse. In keeping with the previous Think Family agenda, the Troubled Families approach launched by the Conservatives in 2011 epitomised this social investment approach. Focusing multi-agency teams on the 400,000 most ‘troubled’ families in Britain, the project aims to ‘turn around’ these families in order to successfully integrate them into ‘normal’ society. The expectation was that for every £4,500 (one-off annual investment) spent on families, a saving of £15,000 per year would be achieved.

Allen (2011a; 2011b) highlighted a number of individual level initiatives, while providing the backdrop for the continued development of this preventative discourse. Whereas Labour heavily invested early on in the concept of social exclusion, the Coalition remained more concerned with the concept of early intervention as a vehicle of prevention. The wider approach to prevention within these reports heavily leans upon early engagement of children, at the earliest stage possible, in order to ensure that they are most likely to pursue positive trajectories. The motivations and methods of such an approach has, however, been heavily criticised by some. The emphasis on parenting is once again strongly significant. Placing early intervention central to the government rhetoric on children and families seemingly provided a smooth transition from the Labour Every Child Matters agenda. However, the wider idiom surrounding this, critics argued, created a fundamentally different discourse for prevention, which appeared to suggest ‘contempt for poor and marginalised families’ (Garrett, 2014: 83). The approach of Michael Gove, the Secretary of State for Education, 2010 to 2014, to early intervention and social work appears to shift to one of wanting to ‘rescue’ children from these poorly performing and socially marginalised parents. In a speech in 2012 he stated:

In all too many cases when we decide to leave children in need with their biological parents we are leaving them to endure a life of soiled nappies and scummy baths, chaos and hunger, hopelessness and despair. These children need to be rescued, just as much as the victims of any other natural disaster. (Gove, 2012)

This additional shift in prevention discourse appears to some critics to further support the rise of the neoliberal ideology set out by Margret Thatcher in 1979 when she infamously stated, ‘there is no such thing as society … only the individual and his family’. The impact on social values that this had was significant. As Couldry (2011) suggests, the pursuit of independence, personal responsibility, self-interest and recognition of the importance and almost sanctity of the market became the commonly held beliefs for maximising the wellbeing of people. Examining the politicisation of relationships within the family sphere, Gillies (2014) argues that these neoliberal values ‘permeated’ through the Labour preventative discourse, setting aside the importance of relationship bonds, love and care in favour of technical approaches to the assessment of ‘parenting skills’. The introduction of parenting orders in Labour’s 1998 Crime and Punishment Disorder Act saw a clear step towards greater involvement of the state in family life, with an apparent assertion that some parents ‘wilfully’ neglected their responsibilities (Grover, 2008). This theme, Gillies argues, has continued into the current government and that this apparent concern for responsible parenting and the children’s wellbeing and protection ‘have been appropriated to justify a highly regulatory approach to family policy, eventually morphing into the distinct doctrine of “early intervention” under the auspices of the [then] current Conservative-led Coalition government’ (Gillies, 2014: 205). This suggests a view of intervention being more about the individual, focusing on personal decisions rather than being the victim of structural inequalities. Gillies further develops this argument by suggesting that the prevention discourse, in continuing to move towards a neoliberal understanding of early intervention, is used as a ‘political rallying point’, targeting poor families to break a perceived cycle of deprivation, while in practice personalising and normalising inequality by making individual parents accountable, under the auspices of caring about children’s wellbeing. As Gillies states: ‘in cementing a broader shift away from state support towards a social investment model, the principle of early intervention marks an ideological convergence between traditional conservatism and economic liberalism, galvanising a cross-party political consensus in the process’ (2014: 205). However, she further suggests that this doctrine is increasingly unstable, based on poor ideas, lack of evidence-based policy and the pursuit of ideological policy.

Reay (2012) argues that the cultural context surrounding parenting and child wellbeing increasingly embraces this individualistic and competitive neoliberal approach with ‘good’ parents being increasingly the ‘good’ consumer, evaluating services and products with rigour and pursuing all avenues to ensure that their child succeeds. This ideology of ‘parentocracy’ presented by Reay focuses on the perceived gold-standard of parenting which is largely child-centred, gender specific and heavily reliant upon mothers nurturing children’s emotional wellbeing and self-confidence. Such an approach ensured class-specific approaches were ‘held to account for the social and structural positions they reflect’ (Gillies, 2014: 211). However, Gillies goes on to argue that most of the central claims that support the parent-centric approach dominating preventative discourse, remain unproven and undefined. This includes Alan Milburn over-claiming Blanden’s (2006) research citing that ‘parenting is four times more influential than socio-economic background’, though regularly re-printed in the media and used to support policy decisions, the original evidence source does not actually suggest this link as starkly (Gillies, 2014). Feinstein’s (2003) study included a secondary analysis of a cohort of people born in the 1970s and relayed interesting findings about the significance of class from an early age in determining outcomes for children. However, there was no identified link to the impact of parenting in this data. Perhaps most famously was Allen’s (2011a) complete misrepresentation of longitudinal neuroscience studies, which he claimed demonstrated the huge and significant impact of neglect on a child’s brain development. The study in fact was based upon extreme cases of neglect far beyond that of the reach of early intervention services. However, Allen visually and literally used this research to suggest significant links between ‘poor’ parenting and a child’s physical development in Early intervention: The next steps (2011a), and was subsequently accused as using a ‘scientific vehicle for public relations campaign to promote early childhood programs more for rhetorical, than scientific reasons’ (Bruer, 2011: 2). However, this research continued to be widely cited in the media though the premise was proved flawed. Furthermore, the continuation of a ‘scientific’ approach to early intervention continues to be part of the early intervention discourse, for example as Allen states: ‘Too few of the Early Intervention Programmes currently being tried in the UK have been rigorously evaluated, making it difficult for the public sector and impossible for the private sector to invest with any confidence’ (2011a: 68).

Thus, there has been a focus on randomised controlled trials to ‘prove’ the impact of certain interventions and to demonstrate a causal link between intervention programmes and outcomes. However, critics of this approach argue that the social world is more complex and not appropriate for such measurements, especially as changes and ‘good’ outcomes remain problematic and debatable (Frost et al, 2015) – for example, how does one define ‘good’ parenting?

The voluntary sector’s role in preventative services for children and families

Suggested as naturally having sympathies with children and families defined as ‘in need’ or ‘at risk’ (Morris et al, 2009), the voluntary sector is automatically set from a mission and moral viewpoint to want to respond to these welfare issues (Billis, 2001). However, theories and research around the voluntary sector’s role in the provision of prevention services for children varies between the recognition of them being well placed in order to engender trust and community engagement, to the voluntary sector as an agency of social control and coercion.

Labour’s policy for transforming the delivery of the public services throughout the late 1990s and 2000s increased the involvement and prominence of the voluntary sector. The consequence of this transformation was a rapid and considerable expansion in the number of services and goods purchased or commissioned from the voluntary sector, resituating the relationship between the state and the voluntary sector. As Blake et al (2006) identified ‘the relationship becomes characterised by the prescription and targets set by central government departments’ (Blake et al, 2006: 26). There are concerns that this relationship leads voluntary sector organisations to being resource led rather than mission or needs led, with organisations compromising values in order to win contracts. Nevertheless, the voluntary sector has historically had a significant role in the wellbeing of children since the Victorian era, for example, with charities such as Banardos, which was founded in 1867 after an outbreak of cholera killed 3,000 people, leaving thousands of children homeless and orphaned (Morris et al, 2009). Labour’s commitment to increase this significance of the voluntary sector within child welfare services saw voluntary sector organisations increasing their contribution to statutory children’s services on a variety of different levels. This included the direct delivery of services to children and their families, advocating on behalf of and supporting work with children, and facilitating participation with children and their families in consultation processes (Kellett, 2011).

As previously mentioned, the Children’s Fund programme, launched in 2000, was one of the key Labour initiatives which widely promoted partnership working with the voluntary sector, and ‘created a test ground between the voluntary sector as well as the statutory sector to provide preventative services to overcome the effects of poverty and disadvantage’ (Artaraz et al, 2007: 307–308). Ring-fencing a large proportion of the funding to commission services from voluntary sector organisations, there was an entrenched assumption that locally placed voluntary sector organisations would be best suited to deliver these types of services at a community-based level. While there is evidence that the voluntary sector can offer a more accessible service to children and families through engendering more trust than state interventions (Artaraz and Thurston, 2005) research into this area is limited. Undertaking a critical analysis of the ‘child rescue’ paradigm in the context of voluntary sector delivery of preventative services, Artaraz et al (2007) found that there exists the assumption that voluntary sector organisations are the sole service providers of prevention services. However, they go on to argue that this was a misconception, ‘resulting from the perception of the flexibility, capacity and fluidity of the sector to ‘venture into new frontiers’ (p 308).

Therefore, the state hopes to capture this uniqueness through partnership and multi-agency working. However, their examination of the evaluation of the National Children’s Fund programme revealed that this is not necessarily the case and remains more of an expectation than a reality (Morris and Barnes, 2008). The evaluation of the Children’s Fund programme identified that while families found the services delivered by the voluntary sector to be accessible, parents were concerned about lack of ongoing support and there was little evidence of multi-agency working. This suggested that the ‘relationship between risk and protective factor and long-term outcomes for children remains unclear’ (Evans et al, 2006). Evans and Pinnock’s (2007) research also suggested voluntary sector organisations delivering community-based interventions were more likely to adopt ‘single-dimensional’ approaches and often neglected to engage holistically with children’s family or work with other professionals to address wider needs and concerns. This led to projects tackling behaviours, attitudes and capabilities in individual children rather than adopting a holistic, community-based approach to build more supportive social environments. This single-dimensional approach was also highlighted by Middleton’s (1999) study, within which she carried out a series of semi-structured interviews with voluntary sector organisations providing preventative services for children with disabilities. Middleton argued that the rise of the contract culture, partnered with the targeting of services was reinforcing the separation of minority groups from wider social groups and was thus viewed as reinforcing social exclusion rather than tackling it. Furthermore, Evans and Pinnock (2007) argue that the often short-term nature and inconsistency of funding can lead to mistrust in sustainability and engagement. Morris et al’s (2009) study examining the National Evaluation of the Children’s Fund supports Evan et al’s research (2006), suggesting that though policy shifts have required local authorities to commit to greater integrated working and joining up of services, the voluntary sector’s role in the delivery of these preventative services has been somewhat inconsistent:

At times, the history and experience of the voluntary and community sector in developing and delivering prevention has been recognised and valued. But other developments have – on occasion almost simultaneously – rendered the third sector vulnerable and dependant on the goodwill and accessibility of local mainstream providers. While the voluntary sector can argue a long history in seeking to meet the needs of children and families at risk of social exclusion, its capacity to influence and inform statutory providers has waxed and waned. (Morris et al, 2009