Olivia Colman and Andy Murray demand Rishi Sunak up support to new parents
More than 80 leading charities and celebrities including actress Olivia Colman and tennis star Sir Andy Murray have demanded Rishi Sunak give better support to new parents and their babies.
They have called for a National Baby and Toddler Guarantee to ensure access to vital services, including maternity, health visiting and mental health provisions. Parents should also be able to get affordable and high-quality childcare and Special Educational Needs and Disability support, they have demanded.
Other signatories of Unicef UK’s open letter, handed to the PM today, include the NSPCC, Save the Children UK, The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, as well as the BBC’s Dr Chris van Tulleken and actors David Harewood and Ewan McGregor. Nearly 50,000 members of the public have also signed the charity’s petition calling for equal access to vital early childhood services to be guaranteed.
Sir Andy Murray is among those demanding Rishi Sunak give better support to new parents and their babies (PA)The letter to the Prime Minister reads: “Families in Britain need your help now. Summer holidays are just around the corner and instead of looking forward to fun-packed, carefree days, many families are faced with the worrying reality of not being able to put food on the table as they struggle to make ends meet.
“The latest Government data shows that child poverty in the UK has increased by 300,000 in a year, bringing the latest estimate to a staggering 4.2 million – but behind these figures are real children and families.”
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The letter references Unicef UK’s polling which last year found 66% of parents of children aged 0-4 years said the cost-of-living crisis had negatively impacted them as they struggle to afford food, pay their bills and cope with increasing childcare costs. Many said they are forced to cut back on buying books, toys, and other items for their children.
Speaking to the Mirror, chief executive of Unicef UK Jon Sparkes said health visitors are often not managing to see parents at all. “You've got people saying ‘I'm a new parent, I've got all these cost of living pressures and no one's supporting me,’” he said.
“We're finding that those mandatory things, such as health visits,that we all thought were mandatory, clearly aren't happening as much as they can, which is not a great thing at the best of times, but if you're also struggling with cost of living, struggling financially, trying to find affordable childcare and so on, it just doubles the impact on babies and toddlers as well as on families.”
Actor Ewan McGregor also signed Unicef UK’s open letter calling for a Baby and Toddler Guarantee (Getty Images for Disney)Mr Sparkes said hard-pressed local authorities are being forced to make “impossible choices” about service provision. He said Unicef UK hasn’t called for an exact funding uplift as of yet, as he emphasised the services included in a Baby and Toddler Guarantee “are already meant to be mandatory”.
Unicef spoke to over 300 families who emphasised the need for the extra support. Mum Claire, from Northamptonshire, told the charity: “I have twin boys who I found myself being a single parent to and they saw a health visitor just once before their second birthday.
“I had massive post-natal depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, and I was forgotten. It wasn’t until I called begging for help that finally something was done, and support was sent. It does need to be free and open to everybody because it is terrifying, absolutely terrifying to be left on your own. I’m just lucky that I have the friends and family that I have.”
Milly, of Swansea, said: “I’ve noticed a huge disparity in postnatal care between me and my friends depending on where we live…Many of my friends have been left alone, to their own devices, without any signposting or wellness checks... There’s not enough support out there for new parents and it should be standardised across the UK”
Rachel, of Kent, said: “I’m the mother to a little boy who has autism, and the early years provision in the area has been awful, we’ve struggled to get any help since my son was diagnosed. We’re struggling to even get access to the nursery hours we’re paying for and can’t get any additional help… When he starts school, it’s likely it will take me out of my job permanently as there is no SEND provision in the area during the school holidays.”
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