National Parenting Strategy
The next item of business is a debate on motion S4M-02888, in the name of Aileen Campbell, on the national parenting strategy for Scotland.
14:05
The Scottish Government’s aspiration is for Scotland to be the best place for children and young people to grow up in. We want all our children to have the best start in life so that they can develop into healthy, happy, confident and successful individuals who are ready and equipped for the challenges of adult life. That aspiration is shared across the chamber.
I am delighted to talk about the Government’s national parenting strategy, which aims to set out a cohesive and compelling narrative about the value and importance of parenting and how it contributes to improving outcomes for children and young people. I also look forward to hearing constructive thoughts and views from representatives across the chamber, which will enable the debate to contribute to the strategy.
Parents and carers are the greatest influences on their bairns’ lives, so we must ensure that they get the support that they need when they need it. I want a parental culture in Scotland in which it is completely normal and never a failure for parents to ask for help or advice to enable them to grow in their role. I want parents to feel empowered, valued, supported and confident in their ability to care for their children. A national parenting strategy will bring the necessary leadership, co-ordination and momentum to this crucial issue and will ensure that, across the public sector and wider Scottish society, we focus on ways in which we can all work together to support parents and carers to do their important job well.
Many of us know that being a parent is both the most rewarding and most challenging role that we ever take on. The strategy will be aimed at all parents, because parents in all circumstances can find parenting difficult. We must ensure that more targeted intensive support is available for families who need it most. The strategy will be relevant not only to mums and dads, but to anyone who is involved in bringing up children—not least grandparents, who play a hugely important role in childcare and provide additional practical and emotional support to their wider families. It is crucial that the parenting strategy recognises and supports the roles that grandparents and other family members play in bringing up children.
The strategy will also include the vital role of kinship carers, adoptive and foster parents—whom it is particularly important to mention during fostering fortnight—and corporate parents, including all of us in the chamber, who have a duty of care and responsibility for our looked-after children. Whenever I refer to parents, I refer to all kinds of parents.
The early years framework that was published in 2008 highlighted the strong influence that parents have on their babies and very young children. The work of the chief medical officer, Sir Harry Burns, has taught us about attachment behaviour, the importance of consistent parenting to help children right from birth to make sense of the world, and the impact that environmental and biological influences have on the development of babies during pregnancy. However, parents often struggle with older children and teenagers—in fact, around a third of all calls to parentline Scotland are from parents of teenagers. For that reason, the parenting strategy will cover the widest possible age group, from pre-conception to adulthood. It will also consider how we can prepare our children and young people to be confident parents of the future.
The strategy must make a practical difference to parents, so it is important that it will have the views of parents at its heart. Over the past few months, we have gathered the views of more than 1,500 parents from throughout Scotland. I say a huge thank you to the many organisations that hosted discussion groups on our behalf. I also record my heartfelt thanks to the parents who took the time to tell us about their experiences. I have had the privilege of meeting some inspirational characters and brave families who have told me—through tears, smiles and laughter—what they believe we need to do. Their views will help to shape our approach.
We asked what would make a real practical difference to them as, for example, disabled parents, teenage parents, grandparents or parents who are affected by imprisonment, substance misuse, alcohol or domestic abuse. We also asked what the best things are about being a parent, because the strategy will also aim to celebrate parenting and to demonstrate the positive value that we must place on parents and carers for the role that they play in improving outcomes for children and young people.
I am delighted that our approach has won praise from Children 1st’s chief executive Anne Houston, who said:
“Children 1st welcomed the Scottish Government’s commitment to develop a national parenting strategy for all parents and carers. We welcome the Scottish Government’s approach to seeking views from such a wide range of people with a parenting role, many of whose voices are not normally heard.”
We will publish a report of parents’ views in June. I have met some of the groups of parents and seen some of the early feedback, so I know that it will be a thought-provoking report.
When we talk about parents, many of us tend to think about mums, so I want to talk about fathers. I am pleased to see a number of dads in the chamber and will be interested to hear what they say during the debate. In our consultations, we have had a lot of feedback from dads, who often tell us that they want to be more involved in their children’s lives but are sometimes made to feel unwelcome or excluded.
Will the minister give way?
I will give way to dad Mark McDonald.
Does the minister agree that an issue that affects fathers—albeit that it is outwith the Scottish Government’s remit—is the short time that they are given for paternity leave, which often does not allow them to pick up some of the slack, especially if the mother has postnatal depression, or allow time for significant bonding with their child?
Mark McDonald has made a valid point. The issue was the subject of discussion in the context of the Queen’s speech in the United Kingdom Parliament, and I look forward to hearing more details about that. We will certainly reflect the wider views of dads in our parenting strategy.
We want to change how we see and respond to fatherhood. In a modern successful Scotland, we want to encourage and support fathers to play a more active role in their children’s upbringing. The strategy will consider how services and communities can become more dad friendly and at how employers can encourage dads and mums to balance the worlds of work and parenthood.
There is no doubt that the agenda is huge and challenging and that change cannot be achieved overnight, which is why we are taking a phased approach. As a starting point, in September we will set out our aspirations for parents and for children and young people throughout Scotland. The position statement will help us to sharpen our focus on parenting, to place higher value on the role of parents, to articulate the benefits of supporting parents and to make the case for parents across a range of services and sectors, while ensuring that appropriate support is tailored to meet need. It will also reflect what parents have told us would make a practical difference, and will set out more detailed plans for later phases of work.
On the basis of meetings that I have had with parents, I anticipate that the next phase of our work, which will kick off later this year, will focus on three strands: parenting in the early years, parenting of older children through to adulthood, and preparing our children and young people to be the parents of the future.
I have set out what is planned for later this year, but we should not forget that a huge amount of excellent work is going on to support parents in Scotland. At national level we have a continuum of support from universal provision to specialist targeted support, which can be shaped to meet the particular needs of children and families at different stages of their lives. At local level, I have had the pleasure of visiting a number of projects and hearing at first hand from the parents who have benefited from their work.
The getting it right for every child approach is making a practical difference by ensuring that our key policies and services are child centred. We want to continue to build on that approach. As the motion says, a number of excellent initiatives are helping to support parents throughout Scotland, including the highly successful play, talk, read campaign, which encourages positive interaction between parents and their wee ones. This year the campaign has a bespoke bus, which is travelling to some of our most deprived and isolated communities.
The family-nurse partnership programme is a preventative, intensive home-visiting programme, which is delivered exclusively to teenage first-time mothers. The programme will be expanded so that by the end of 2013 it will support three times as many families as it currently supports.
A key and recurring theme that parents raise is childcare, which has been the subject of intense debate in Parliament. We know that high-quality early learning and childcare are vital in improving outcomes for children, and in enabling parents to participate in the labour market, so we are putting in place a range of measures to increase the amount of flexible affordable provision.
The forthcoming children and young people bill will increase the flexibility of early learning and childcare provision by increasing entitlement from 475 hours per annum to 600 hours per annum of early learning and childcare for three and four-year-olds and looked-after two-year-olds. This financial year we committed £4.5 million from the early years change fund to support local authorities in providing early learning and childcare for our most vulnerable two-year-olds, and we have established a £4.5 million communities and families fund to support community-based solutions for family support and childcare.
We will develop public-social partnerships to pilot early learning and childcare services in areas of particular or unmet need, and we will hold a national summit in June to explore new ways of working with the private sector to promote more flexible working and family-friendly practices. In addition, we are establishing a sub-group of the early years task force to consider how we might develop high-quality integrated and co-ordinated family centres and early learning and childcare services.
In conclusion, I say that I am very excited about the parenting strategy and the role that it can play in improving lives in families across Scotland. I know that we all recognise the importance of supporting parents as a way of improving outcomes for children and young people, and I will sincerely welcome constructive views from colleagues across the chamber on the approach that I have set out.
I move,
That the Parliament supports the Scottish Government’s aspiration to making Scotland the best place in the world for children to grow up; acknowledges that the vast majority of parents in Scotland already provide excellent support for their children; recognises the vital role that parents and carers play, not only in improving outcomes for children and young people in their care, but also in creating stronger communities and a more positive future for all; agrees that all parents need support at times and that parents and carers bringing up children in difficult circumstances may need additional support; welcomes the development of a national parenting strategy as a way of driving forward the shared ambition for improving outcomes for children and young people across Scotland; supports the approach taken to gathering the views of a diverse range of 1,500 parents whose voices are not normally heard and using this as a foundation for the national parenting strategy; thanks the many organisations that have hosted discussion groups with parents on the Scottish Government’s behalf, and welcomes the Scottish Government’s commitment to continued working in partnership with parents and a wide range of partner agencies to develop the detail of the work.
14:15
I do not think that any member would argue about the importance of parents in a child’s life. Parents and other guardians are often the biggest influence on children’s life chances, and we know that children thrive in a stable and supportive home environment.
As I have said several times before, we will work with the Government when it is doing things right and we will challenge it when it is not. The Labour Party has a track record of commitment to supporting parents and children. The “For Scotland’s children: Better integrated children’s services” report in 2001 drew together an action team of experts from local government, the national health service and the voluntary sector to look at how better to integrate children’s services, and it was Labour that introduced the getting it right for every child agenda to ensure that all Scotland’s children, young people and their families have consistent and co-ordinated support. I am pleased that the Scottish National Party Government is carrying on that agenda.
Labour members therefore welcome the Scottish Government’s indication that it plans to support parents and other guardians, but we want to see more urgent action to support parents. The truth is that there is little to applaud or oppose so far in relation to the national parenting strategy and this debate. We have a debate not to launch a consultation process or even, at the end, to discuss the strategy. The strategy is not yet tangible, and although most people would support the broad principle of a strategy in which parents are consulted and that seeks to support them with parenting, the real test is still to come.
I grant that a lot of the consultation work with parents who face particular challenges has been done, but my intention in having the debate was to give members an opportunity to shape and focus how we take forward the parenting strategy. I hope that Opposition members support that approach.
I will certainly give the minister some suggestions later in my speech.
Better preparing and supporting parents in the responsibilities and opportunities that are provided by parenthood gives us the chance to set out how we would like our children to grow up. It is vital that we use the opportunity to do just that and—crucially—to support parents rather than simply to lecture them. We need to develop a strategy that embeds in our culture the idea that it is natural—that it is expected, even—that all parents need advice and support at some stage. We must challenge the stigma that says that only vulnerable parents and parents at risk need a helping hand. That is why Labour members want to see more action from the Government to support parents and other guardians. We want to see the Government deliver on the promises that it has already made, and we want to take the opportunity to make other suggestions.
We want the Government to support parents. That should include working with local authorities, health boards and the voluntary sector to improve the existing network of family centres, and it should start with communities in which there are the highest levels of deprivation. Family centres provide support and advice for parents as well as specialised intensive work with vulnerable children. That can include play sessions, transition support, mentoring and respite. I know that both the Labour and the SNP manifestos included a commitment to a new generation of family centres, so I expect that we will see specific plans for that detailed in the strategy.
It has been mentioned that we also need to see action to increase free childcare and nursery provision for three-years-olds and four-year-olds. As we know, the SNP Government made a pledge on that back in 2007, and it could be introduced now with a simple piece of legislation. Instead, childcare measures are being folded into a children’s bill that will take years to implement. We want action to support parents and other guardians sooner rather than later.
We support initiatives such as the FAST—families and schools together—project, which is run by Save the Children. It aims to boost the chances of children in the UK’s most deprived areas by supporting parents to improve their children’s learning and development at home so that they can reach their full potential at school.
According to Save the Children, teachers have reported, after just eight weeks, a 10 per cent improvement in reading, writing and maths among children who are enrolled in the FAST programme, and that 73 per cent of parents have become more involved in their children’s education. That demonstrates significant developments in a short time. I was pleased to visit one such project in Clydebank late last year.
We also need a corporate parenting strategy that will improve our performance as corporate parents to the most vulnerable children who most need our help. We hope and anticipate that commitments to those ideas will be part of the national parenting strategy.
We need action from the Government to support parents and other guardians. Although the Scottish Government talks a good game in that regard, we would feel more confident if the Government had already delivered on its commitment to support parents and on the promises that it has made. There would be no better way for the Scottish Government to show that it is serious about supporting parents and other guardians than to deliver on those specific promises.
I mentioned increased nursery provision earlier; another such commitment is on kinship care. The level of financial support for kinship carers is less than the support for foster carers in far too many local authorities, and we hear from kinship carers about patchy support depending on which local authority area they live in. Patchy support is little better than no support at all.
We know that the First Minister committed on 27 September 2007 to providing £10 million to fund financial support that is equivalent to that which is paid to foster parents. Successive SNP ministers made further commitments that the promise would be met via the concordat with local government by 2011 at the latest, but that is still not happening.
In 2007, the Scottish Government promised aid to kinship carers—who are often elderly and making sacrifices to help children, and who are seeking not massive sums but simply equal treatment—and yet it did not deliver. What does that say about the Scottish Government’s commitment to supporting parents and guardians?
Will the member take an intervention?
The member is in his last minute.
If the Government continues to let down kinship carers, what hope do other parents have that the national parenting strategy will help them?
If the Government is serious about supporting parents and other guardians, it should deliver on its commitments. Parents, kinship carers and children need support. I hope that the national parenting strategy will be a strategy of action that supports parents and children and delivers on the promises that have been made.
I move amendment S4M-02888.3, to leave out from “development” to end and insert:
“input from many organisations; believes that kinship care should be an essential part of a National Parenting Strategy, and calls on the Scottish Government to bring forward Scotland-wide implementation of the promise made by the First Minister on 27 September 2007 to provide £10 million for kinship care allowances.”
14:22
We Conservatives welcome the debate, and in so doing we recognise the importance of a permanent and loving family environment in which to bring up children. The Scottish Government’s motion rightly highlights the role that parents and carers play in the development of our young people, but perhaps more important is that it acknowledges the need to support families who are experiencing difficulties.
I think that all members in the chamber would agree that children’s formative years are shaped by the environment in which they are brought up, and that factors such as poverty and poor health can have a negative impact on a child’s eventual transition into adulthood.
The recent growing up in Scotland survey gave an insight into some of the more worrying statistics that are available on physical health, such as the prevalence of tooth decay. Approximately 38 per cent of children in primary 1 suffer from that condition, which is linked to the fact that approximately 35 per cent of schoolchildren consume snacks with high sugar or fat content more than once a day, while 69 per cent lack a varied fruit and vegetable diet.
We all know that if children are to develop into healthy and responsible adults who have achieved their educational and physical potential and are ready to take on the role of parenting the next generation, there is a lot more to it than food. Their earliest years are all-important. The briefing that members have received from Barnardo’s Scotland—an organisation for which I have enormous respect—neatly sums up what we should be aiming for in a society in which, sadly, there exist families in which there are generations of people who have not had good parenting and who do not have parenting skills to pass on.
Barnardo’s says that a national parenting strategy should be based on three principles: “prepare, advise and support”. It says that it must also
“focus on all aspects of parenting from pre-conception, pre-birth, birth, early years, 16-18, and transition to adulthood.”
I absolutely agree with Barnardo’s, and I think that we should always bear in mind what it says as the national strategy develops. I was encouraged by the minister’s comments in that regard.
I was also pleased by the minister’s comments about fathers, because I am totally convinced that it is extremely important that children have, where possible, positive interaction with both parents. To date, many fathers have had a raw deal, particularly when relationships have broken down.
A number of fathers have been in touch with me about that. Does Nanette Milne agree that the courts seem to start from the position that the mother should have the main contact and the father must argue for every inch?
Yes, I absolutely agree with John Mason. My family has experience of that situation, although we had a very positive outcome and my grandchildren have great access to both parents. It is a serious problem that worries me a lot. As a grandparent, I am extremely fortunate, but some grandparents have serious difficulties in being able to look after their grandchildren.
I turn to children in care or, more specifically, looked-after children. We recognise that among them there is a significant problem with regard to educational attainment, and it is quite clear that there is a link between attendance and exclusion rates and being in care, whether it is residential, kinship or foster care. In the past 10 years, we have seen the number of looked-after children rise by a staggering 69 per cent—the figure now stands at over 15,000, which is the highest level for 30 years. In my region—North East Scotland—the number of children in care in Dundee has doubled over the space of a decade and children’s services are said to be reaching saturation point.
The problems do not stop once children have left school. In 2009-10, 56 per cent of young adults gained five or more qualifications at Scottish credit and qualifications framework or higher level. A mere 0.5 per cent of school leavers who were in care got the same results.
The establishment of the early years task force in November last year was a real and welcome attempt by the Scottish Government to bring together key stakeholders including local government, the national health service, the police and the third sector—all of which have an impact on the early years of children’s lives. Helping the most vulnerable of Scotland’s children is a particular aim of the task force, and I look forward to the development of the childcare strategy as it evolves to support all Scotland’s parents in their vital task.
The general theme of the amendment in my name, which I hope the minister might be minded to accept, is that we feel that, if we are to help our young people to appreciate the responsibilities that come with parenthood, schools must have a role to play. Therefore, our amendment pays tribute to the teachers who are trained in providing the invaluable additional support that our most vulnerable young people require at the earliest age. I hope that the minister shares my concerns about the fact that the number of those teachers appears to be falling. Perhaps she will address that situation in her closing remarks.
We are very happy to support the Government in developing a parenting strategy if the intention is to bring all the necessary strands together in one overarching framework, which parents and teachers alike want to see.
I move amendment S4M-02888.1, to insert at end:
“; recognises that, as well as parents and carers, schools also have an important role to play in helping young people to appreciate the responsibilities that come with parenthood; pays tribute to the teachers who are trained in providing additional support requirements and who do so much to ensure that the most vulnerable young people are identified at the earliest age; notes with concern the recent evidence that indicates declining numbers of these teachers, and calls on the Scottish Government to address this concern as a matter of urgency.”
We move to the open debate. I remind members that speeches should be up to four minutes long.
14:28
I am glad to speak in this important debate on a national parenting strategy for Scotland.
I congratulate my colleague Jim Eadie on sponsoring yesterday evening’s event in Parliament that showcased Children 1st’s national services. The excellent presentations detailed the work of three key support services that are funded and supported by the Scottish Government. The first was safeguarding in sport, which works with sports’ governing bodies and with clubs, parents and—above all—children to ensure that young people who participate in sport are protected and supported, and that proper practices are in place.
Parentline Scotland was the second service that was highlighted. It is the free helpline and e-mail service that Children 1st runs for anyone who is concerned about a child. It is provided by trained volunteers and call takers and is open seven days a week, 365 days a year.
We then heard about the work that Children 1st is doing on national kinship care and about the advice and support that it provides to families and carers who are in that position. Mr Bibby mentioned that little support is akin to no support at all, but I remind him that no support at all was available before 2009, when the Scottish Government introduced the looked-after children regulations, which for the first time allowed the payment of allowances for kinship carers.
Children 1st treated us to a couple of role-play calls to their support services. It was immediately obvious that signposting to other support agencies and local programmes is a key element in their successful outcomes. It brought home to me the importance of cross-agency, cross-society integrated partnerships to the success of a national parenting strategy.
The minister’s motion expresses Scotland’s ambition to have all our children safe, secure and adequately and appropriately supported in reaching their full potential. As the work of Children 1st has demonstrated, the approach must be holistic and involve all aspects of a child’s life—education, social interaction or sporting activity. The role of the voluntary sector is key to that success.
A national parenting strategy must ensure that all partners—education, social work, health, and the voluntary sector—work seamlessly within a framework of services and service planning that addresses a continuum of need, from prevention and early intervention to acute services. Although we recognise that key services will be delivered locally, this is a national strategy that should deliver national improvements and outcomes for our children.
Parents and carers must be an integral part of that support service. I believe that parenting and caring are undervalued roles in our society. Mark McDonald mentioned paternity leave, which is perhaps an indication of that—we have such little time with young children, as parents. Parents and carers must be part of the solution, and they must be integrated into it and not be defined as the problem. Our integrated services must work with parents in improving outcomes for our young people.
Much of today’s debate will focus on the early years. However, we must not forget that there are children in the system who need our additional support. I commend Made4U in ML2, which is in my area—Central Scotland—and is working with young people to build resilience in the parents of the future.
14:32
I am always glad to have the opportunity to discuss how we can improve the lives of children and young people in Scotland, and today is no different. However, it would perhaps have been more useful to have the opportunity to debate an actual parenting strategy rather than just a motion that welcomes its development.
When we have a UK Government attacking public services and delivering damaging welfare reform that will impact on the lives of people throughout the country, it has to be recognised that, often, it is children and young people who are hardest hit. That, coupled with the Scottish Government’s cuts to further education and its continued broken promises on education and the falling numbers of pre-school teachers, mean that, for many people, childhood is not shaping up to be the happiest years of their lives, which is a pity.
Like in Glasgow.
Mr Wilson, will you please stop shouting across the chamber?
The importance of the early years to a person’s development is now more apparent than ever. That should be reflected by action to improve children’s start in life. The SNP’s commitment to increase nursery education to 600 hours could have been part of that. However, just as with the parenting strategy, parents and children are still waiting on its delivery. That commitment could have been met quickly and simply, but instead it is held up and will be part of the forthcoming rights of children and young people bill.
Thankfully, as I am sure that members will agree, Labour in Glasgow has committed to guaranteeing that every child in the city will have 15 hours of childcare a week from the age of three, which means that it is delivering more hours than the current Scottish national provision, despite the swingeing cuts that Glasgow City Council received from the Scottish Government.
Will the member give way?
My Labour colleagues in Glasgow—
Will the member give way?
The member is not giving way.
—will also extend the vulnerable twos programme, which offers support to vulnerable children across the city and will focus resources on parenting support for people with children in the early years. Furthermore, another 10 family learning centres will open across the city over the next five years. All those actions will support children and young people as well as the adults who look after them and I hope that the Scottish Government will encourage other local authorities to implement similar policies. If the Scottish Government wants to make Scotland the best place in the world to grow up in, what is happening in Glasgow provides great examples of what needs to be done.
However, as a parent of three children who are all at school now—I hope—I know that if we want to improve the lives of children and young people, we need to do more than deliver in the early years. Like the national parenting strategy, the forthcoming children and young people bill presents an opportunity to take forward an agenda that will improve the lives of all children, including the most vulnerable young people in our communities, which is most important. Under it, ministers will be required to have regard to children and young people’s rights and views in making policy. Although that is, of course, a step in the right direction and although I support the intention behind the proposals, I must point out that children and young people might still lose out if the proposals do not cover local authority and health board decision making. The same goes for the national parenting strategy, which must cover all areas that impact on the lives of young people and the adults who look after them.
That kind of overarching approach to enhancing the lives of all Scotland’s children and young people is a must. They deserve the best life chances and we must do our bit to support that.
14:36
I congratulate the minister on securing this debate on the national parenting strategy and the Government on taking the time to consult families from a wide variety of backgrounds and all the organisations involved in parenting in developing the strategy. There is no magic bullet in parenting; if there were, we would all be using it and would be having no problems in bringing up our children.
I recall impending parenthood, the plethora of bestselling parenting guides and arguments with previous generations about the best way of parenting. We always ask children what they want to be when they grow up and give them lots of careers advice, but do we emphasise enough the enormous and lifelong commitment involved in being a parent? Nothing is more important than giving our children the best start in life, and parents must come to realise that parenthood is not about material things but about caring, nurturing and developing their children.
As a result, I am pleased that a key part of the strategy is building parents’ resilience, skills, capacity and confidence and raising the importance and value of parenting—and, in turn, children—in our society. We are certainly not helped in those efforts by certain media outlets that portray children as little more than fashion accessories.
Given my previous comments about the importance of antenatal classes as a vehicle for learning not only about the process of birth but about the wider context of bringing up children, I was dismayed to read last week about a recent National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children report that cited a survey suggesting that 65 per cent of new mothers from middle-class backgrounds but less than 39 per cent of disadvantaged mothers have attended antenatal classes. We need to do some work on that area, and it will probably fall to general practices and primary care to ensure that, through health visitors, midwives and others, parents receive the support in very early years that they need.
The NSPCC report also touched on the isolation felt by new mothers. I know that, as a new mother who had just moved into a new area, I would have felt pretty isolated had it not been for the support of the local mothers and toddlers group.
We must congratulate organisations such as Parenting Across Scotland that keep bringing the problems of families to our attention through their literature and the events that they frequently hold in Parliament. I always make the effort to attend those.
As the minister has said, we know about the importance of the time between pre-birth and school. Long gone are the days when, once the health visitor’s visits had finished, children did not come to the attention of the authorities again until they started school at the age of five.
We have seen the increase in childcare and nursery provision. The increase is on-going and exponential.
Family-nurse partnerships are a great concept that is currently being rolled out, although we would not think so if we listened to some Labour members.
I am glad that the minister mentioned the teenage years, and I commend the work of the Blue Horizon Youth Project in my constituency.
The pressures continue, but we are working on them.
14:41
Developing a national parenting strategy that is coherent and relevant to families across Scotland is a laudable aim, but the motion is an extended exercise in stating the obvious. The Scottish Government is seeking the admiration of Parliament for aspiring to make Scotland
“the best place in the world to grow up”
and for having the foresight to canvass the views of 1,500 parents and carers. It flanks that with a series of humdrum observations, such as
“all parents need support at times”
and
“parents and carers bringing up children in difficult circumstances may need additional support”.
Given the overwhelming banality of those statements, I am relieved that the Government is taking the time to gather more informed opinion.
Although the Government’s aim to make Scotland
“the best place in the world to grow up”
is an excellent example of Salmond’s much-cherished blue-sky thinking, we might want to begin by making Scotland the best place to grow up in the European Union or even in the UK.
As my colleague Neil Bibby observed in a debate in March, the Labour Government of 1997 to 2010 made children and young people a top priority. The introduction of 3,500 sure start centres, which were targeted at the poorest areas, was listed by the Institute for Government as one of the most successful policies of the past 30 years. Sure start was predicated on empirical evidence that illustrated the importance to a child’s development of being talked and listened to, and being treated with patience, empathy and understanding. It was a genuine attempt to tackle the devastating correlation between the early experience of poverty and deprivation, and poor educational performance and life prospects.
Will the member give way?
No, thanks. Despite the coalition Government’s sad, if predictable, dismantling of it, sure start remains a shining example of the early years provision to which we should aspire. Unfortunately, the Scottish Government is lagging behind.
On Monday, I attended an informal childcare conversation with parents at the Burnbank family centre in Hamilton, which was organised by Save the Children. For the parents I spoke to, flexibility is critical. As they pointed out, 600 hours of free nursery provision is no use if it is not available when parents need it. Flexibility is especially important to low-income families, who rely most on state childcare and are more likely to be engaged in professions with rigid working hours.
To achieve that, we might look to Europe for inspiration. A recent submission from Children in Scotland to the Parliament’s European and External Relations Committee made a persuasive case for the formation of an early childhood education and care system that would be similar to those that we find in other European countries. The submission outlines how that would improve the prospects of young children while simultaneously tackling the problems of female and youth unemployment through increased flexibility for parents and demand in the childcare workforce.
Combining high-quality, nurturing care with good early learning requires a skilled and qualified workforce. The European countries that have such a workforce have the best outcomes in terms of children’s happiness, health and wellbeing. That is what we should be aiming at.
There are examples closer to home of what a good parenting strategy might consist of. Last September, North and South Lanarkshire councils, in conjunction with NHS Lanarkshire and other service providers, formulated a parenting strategy. It includes a range of core commitments that are aligned to benefits and outcomes that are designed to provide support and guidance to local parents and care providers. It also offers a range of innovations for future consideration. For example, it stresses the importance of engaging with male parents and carers as early as possible, and encourages them to have a positive and active role in their child’s life. It also recommends the signposting of locally arranged activities such as parent and toddler groups, parent and teacher meetings and parent support groups. Those encompass the whole parenting spectrum, from prenatal classes to managing teenage behaviour. As many members will know far better than I do, parenting is a lifelong vocation.
Those are just a few ideas for how we can enhance childcare in Scotland. We must concentrate on getting it right for Scotland’s parents and carers. In doing so, we can help to give our children the best possible start in life which, I believe, is the most that any Government can offer.
14:45
I am delighted to take part in the debate. I had hoped that it might be slightly more consensual and that we would hear from Opposition members about some of the good things that have been happening. The Government has done a remarkable job of listening to what parents require. It is important that we listen to what parents ask for and that we act on that information. We are in phase 1 of a three-phase national strategy. I hope that Opposition members will make a slightly more positive contribution to the next debate on the issue.
The minister said that being a parent is both rewarding and challenging. I endorse that. I am a father of twins. This might be difficult to believe but, when my wife told me that she was expecting and that it was twins, I was speechless. However, being an Aberdonian, I thought that two for the price of one was perhaps not a bad deal. The challenge of being a parent soon came home to me. Because I am not a heavy sleeper, I decided with my wife—who was delighted at the time—that I would get up during the night to feed and change both my girls. One night, my wife sat up straight in bed and said, “You are remembering, aren’t you, to give the bottles to both of them and not to the same one twice?”
It is a challenge being a parent. Initially, we thought about how we would manage and who we could turn to. We were supported by family, the medical profession and health visitors. That still happens today.
Last night, Children 1st said that it had just received its 40,000th phone call to parentline. Although it is to be congratulated on that service, the figure shows that there is a problem and that people are crying out for help. That is why the strategy has been introduced which, as a parent, I am delighted about.
When I heard about the play talk read campaign, that took me back to the time that I had with my children when they were very young. I was scolded many times by my wife because telling them a story before they went to bed was supposed to calm them down, and I was not very good at that—I probably excited them more with my storytelling than I would have if I had been reading from a book.
There are challenges for parents. There is a challenge for me as a parent because I now have only one daughter, who is a teenager. The reward and the challenge are still there and my daughter, Fiona, knows how to challenge her father.
I think that you speak for all fathers of daughters everywhere.
14:48
As another father of a daughter, and of a son, I recognise much of what my colleague Dennis Robertson said. My brother had a not dissimilar reaction to that of Dennis Robertson when he found out that his wife was expecting twins.
I will cover three areas: postnatal depression; paternity leave, which I raised in my intervention; and play. On postnatal depression, during a Finance Committee discussion on family-nurse partnerships, the issue of the psychological impact on the child of a parent with postnatal depression was highlighted. That is why it is key that we consider how to ensure early diagnosis of postnatal depression. A suggestion that I throw forward is that the minister could speak to her colleagues in the Government about whether, at the six-week postpartum check-up that every woman has, women could be asked to complete the Edinburgh scale test, which detects postnatal depression. That might help with early diagnosis of the condition, which can often be missed, and would prevent women from developing more severe postnatal depression further down the line.
Another issue that we perhaps need to look at is how we develop and nurture support groups for women with postnatal depression, both support groups that are co-ordinated by local authorities or health boards and ones that come together organically when they are formed by women in communities who know each other and know that they are suffering from postnatal depression. How can we support those groups to ensure that they develop and help those women? Organisations such as Home-Start Aberdeen, which recruits and trains volunteers to visit families at home and offer them informal, friendly and confidential support, have a vital role to play in signposting and in helping to identify people.
I touched on paternity leave in my intervention on the minister. As I have been through the process myself, what I am saying might sound a bit selfish. As a local authority councillor, I was in the fortunate position that I could work more from home, which meant that I got a bit more time with my children, but often that is not possible and the father has only a fleeting two weeks with the child.
Paternity leave does not take into account the fact that the woman might have complications. For example, if the mother has had a C-section, she has six weeks when she cannot drive and is not allowed to do any heavy lifting. If she has older children who are perhaps four or five years old, it can be a real difficulty if she is not allowed to lift them to any great degree or carry them and is unable to go out and do the shopping. Consideration must be given to those issues. I acknowledge that the matter is not within the remit of the Scottish Government, but I hope that the minister might factor those issues into her considerations and the discussions that she might have with her UK counterparts.
I believe that play is vital in developing children’s social skills and more needs to be done to increase opportunities for play. I welcome the funding that the Scottish Government has allocated in that regard. Local organisations in my area, such as Aberdeen Play Forum, are doing a lot of work to try to increase opportunities for play by working with a range of organisations.
We must also include reading within play. I always remember the quote attributed to Albert Einstein:
“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.”
Initiatives such as bookbug, which is run by the Scottish Book Trust, are vital. Although we focus on a wide range of areas, the most important advice that we can give to parents is this: play with your children and read them bedtime stories.
14:52
As a father of two sons, I dedicate, if not my speech, at least the flourishing grey hairs on my head to the pair of them.
I have put on record my support for the development of a national parenting strategy and recognise that the debate is part of that process. This will not be a straightforward exercise. To be successful, it will need to encompass and reflect a broad range of circumstances and needs. That is borne out in the motion, which rightly highlights the work that is being done by some of the many stakeholders, including parents. The rather self-congratulatory tone of the motion is predictable, but I support its general thrust.
Of course, however difficult the task of developing a parenting strategy, the challenge will be in ensuring that its fine sentiments are matched by appropriate action that delivers the shared ambition that we have for what it should be like to grow up in Scotland. Some of that will be about practical support, advice and guidance being given, including at an early stage in our schools. Some of it will be about helping to shift cultural attitudes, not least by reducing the stigma that is attached to seeking help, and by considering the role of fathers, which Mark McDonald and others have rightly highlighted.
The two amendments raise valid points in the context of developing an effective and comprehensive parenting strategy. Nanette Milne’s amendment picks up a theme that emerged in the Education and Culture Committee’s evidence session earlier this week on additional support for learning. I hope that ministers will take the issue seriously.
Neil Bibby is right to express the particular needs of kinship carers, which deserve specific attention. Indeed, as a number of us saw last night at the Children 1st reception, the existence of a dedicated kinship carer support line is testament to the fact that the group has distinct needs, which are best met by appropriately trained staff and volunteers. The First Minister’s promise in 2007 to deliver parity in care allowances was unambiguous. It raised expectations, falsely as it turns out. Rectifying that may not be straightforward but, as things stand, the issue is having a demoralising effect on many kinship carers.
In the brief time that is available, I will touch on a few of the many points that merit much more detailed consideration. A distinct component of the strategy must relate to the corporate parenting of looked-after children. The outcomes for that group—particularly for children who are looked after at home—remain unacceptably poor. A commitment to addressing that persistent problem is resolute across the parties, and action is taking place on the ground. That is exemplified by Barnardo’s, Aberlour and other organisations, which are also active in raising awareness about the need to better equip those who are responsible for corporate parenting.
Emphasising the importance of the early identification of problems, risks and, when necessary, intervention will be key. There is an interesting debate to be had about how long a corporate parent should remain responsible. After all, when a son or daughter leaves home, they do not cease to need their parents’ support, encouragement and love.
Seeking advice and support as a parent is not always easy, of course. A perceived stigma is undoubtedly attached to that. In some cases, it might be felt that help with parenting is for those who are in crisis—Neil Bibby made that point. In other cases, people might be unwilling to engage with services that could provide help. Each situation requires a different solution, which illustrates the difficulty in developing a strategy that is seen as relevant across the board.
Barnardo’s talks about the three principles—to prepare, to advise and to support—with the focus on all aspects of parenting from pre-conception through to the transition to adulthood. That makes sense, and there is much good work to draw on, which must be properly harnessed. Partnership working and signposting across and between agencies must be embedded, and the Parliament must scrutinise progress rigorously and demand changes when they are necessary.
Improving the availability and affordability of childcare is key, as the minister acknowledged and highlighted in the childcare debate that I led in the chamber earlier this year.
We will return to such issues many times in the coming months and in the context of the upcoming children and young people bill. I look forward to that and to working with all who have an interest in the subject to ensure that we achieve what is a shared ambition across the chamber.
14:56
Last week, I saw my 17-year-old son bedecked in a cow costume, off to his last official day at school—it was him in the cow costume, not me. I make it clear that, although I live in and represent a rural constituency, cow costumes are not the recognised uniform of the local secondary school; rather, that was part of the sixth years marking a landmark day in the way that only teenagers could.
When I turned back down our hallway after locking the door behind my son, my eye was drawn to a picture of Lewis and me preparing for his very first day at school, some 13 years ago. Initially, I was struck by how much thinner I was and by how much more hair I had back then, not to mention the fact that my son was quite cute back in 1999. Inevitably followed the thought, “Where on earth have the years in between gone?”
That moment gave way to pondering whether my wife and I had, as parents, done a decent job in raising not only our younger child but our 23-year-old daughter. Given the people whom they have become, I think that the answer is yes, but the credit for that belongs not only to us but to our parents, because is it not the case that a person’s take on parenting derives mostly from the manner in which they were raised?
When someone has kids, no one hands them the A to Z of parenting. Advice—sometimes welcome and sometimes not—is offered from a variety of quarters but, generally speaking, people go with their instinct, which inevitably has been heavily influenced by their experiences of growing up. Why else do we parents find ourselves, after we have picked up our kids from something or sought to guide them in a particular direction, thinking, “Oh no—I’ve become my mum and dad. I remember them saying exactly the same thing to me”?
Not everyone who becomes a parent has such great experiences growing up as my wife and I did or has the family support network that we were fortunate enough to enjoy. That is why I warmly welcome the national parenting strategy, which is designed to enable parents and carers to provide the best environment possible in which to raise children. It aims to remove barriers to positive parenting and is about creating a truly nurturing and supportive environment for the forthcoming generations of Scots.
I was struck by a comment that Donna Bell of the growing up in Scotland study made a couple of months ago. She said:
“A lot of the international evidence and some of the evidence from Scotland suggests that some people in ... straitened circumstances are very good parents. We would not make a link between such circumstances and poor parenting. It is very clear ... that it is about what parents do, not what they are”.—[Official Report, Finance Committee, 7 March 2012; c 842.]
That is a valid observation. It is extremely easy to make sweeping generalisations and to assume that kids from disadvantaged backgrounds are automatically more likely to be poorly raised and to end up not realising their potential. Financial circumstances and the home environment are of course determining factors, but plenty of kids from less affluent backgrounds are raised well.
There are kids from wealthier families who are allowed to do as they please and end up getting into bother. I have previously mentioned the issue of underage drinking in certain towns in my constituency. If we talk to the police officers charged with dealing with that issue, they will tell us that the problem crosses all sectors of society. Indeed, they will tell us that, all too often, the least supportive responses they get when they take home inebriated 12 and 13-year-olds are from the relatively affluent households.
I hope that the national parenting strategy reaches out across the social spectrum, educating and supporting parents from all parts of society so that we improve the life chances of our children.
Although this debate will not command the television minutes or column inches that others do, it is no less important than others we have had or others still to come. I can think of nothing more important than, as the motion says,
“making Scotland the best place in the world for children to grow up”.
Independence, and putting Scotland’s wealth to work for the people of Scotland will greatly assist in that process, but today we can start our country on that path. I support the motion.
15:00
One of the pleasures of growing older is a return to the early years through looking after and playing with grandchildren. Apart from the pleasure that I get from that, it has reinforced my belief that how we treat children in the early years of life—in particular, in the first three years—is absolutely crucial for the development of individuals and the future of society. That is why I welcome the emerging strategy from the Government. In the past, people would probably have said that parenting is not the business of Government, yet I can think of little that is more important for Government to address now.
I particularly welcome the minister’s statement that strand 3 of the strategy would be about preparing young people to be the parents of the future. I am sure that most of us in the chamber—the younger ones and the older ones—did not really have any preparation for being a parent. I am looking forward to that part of the strategy because I think that it is a desirable prerequisite for the support that parents need once they have children. The fundamental principle underlying the strategy should be support for all families but with more intensive support, and sometimes very intensive support, for those families that need it most.
There is perhaps a distinction to be made between supporting families in general, which can be formal or informal and is offered by a variety of people and professionals, and specific parenting support that is delivered by people who are trained to ensure high fidelity to a specific programme. There are many outstanding examples of support for parents in the first sense. I mention in passing organisations for young parents in the Pilton and Granton parts of my constituency, such as Circle and Stepping Stones, and, in Leith, Home-Start and Dr Bell’s family centre. I apologise to those that I have not mentioned. Dr Bell’s is an interesting example of a family centre on a fairly small scale, and I am pleased that the Government is considering family centres as part of the support given to parents.
On specific programmes, the positive parenting programme, the incredible years and the family-nurse partnership have the strongest evidence behind them. I am particularly interested in the family-nurse partnership because it focuses on the very early years. As I said, I have come to believe—and I think that many in Parliament share my view—that the years nought to three are the most fundamental years in anyone’s life, and that how people are treated then will determine their life outcomes. I was reflecting the other day that, sadly, many people spend the rest of their lives trying to undo the damage that has been done to them in those first three years of life.
In that regard, there is an issue about the balance between universal and targeted services. Health visitors have a key role to play in identifying the most vulnerable children and allowing other services to move in to give them support. Perhaps we went too far in targeting health visiting under the “Health for all Children 4” arrangements, although, as they were introduced when I was the responsible minister, I will hardly criticise them. However, I am pleased that the Government is now talking about implementing the new Hall 4, which involves continuing visits to a larger number of families. I welcome that.
Giving support at an early stage is fundamental. If we do that, more children can stay in their families. However, we recognise that in some cases children have to be removed from families. When that has to take place, the earlier it happens, the better. I recently had an interesting conversation with a constituent who has had difficulties in adopting children. She explained to me that the process has taken two years and is still not complete. I wrote to the cabinet secretary about that and eagerly await a reply. I hope that the issue of adoption can be looked at because when adoption is necessary it should take place as speedily as possible.
We now come to the closing speeches.
15:04
I thank the organisations that provided useful briefings for the debate, including Save the Children, Barnardo’s Scotland, Children 1st and Children in Scotland. Like other members, I declare an interest as a proud father. I have six children—that is not bad for a Protestant. My eldest is 23 years old and my youngest is five years old. I hope that they will all be Conservatives one day, but who knows?
The Scottish Conservatives know that a child’s early years are key to their future. I am very lucky to come from a happy family, and to have a happy family. I do not mean to say that a family should not argue, but families should be taught that argument is better than fighting. It is vital that children develop and achieve their potential.
We recognise that virtually every parent will need support at some stage in the parenting experience, with particular assistance required for parents who face the most acute challenges and difficulties. When she was our party leader, my esteemed colleague, Annabel Goldie, was right to talk about the obligation on politicians to help the people who struggle most with parenthood. We are proud that our manifesto committed to moving £20 million from the health budget to provide more and better support for new parents through a massive increase in home health visiting services.
On a personal note, my wife, Emma, gave me some input for the debate. She made a valid point that specific time should be set aside when children and parents can sit down together, without the distractions of electrical gadgets, gaming kits or televisions, and have proper conversations. Most people would agree that it is important that children are listened to by their parents, and that they learn the art of conversation from an early age. Some games, toys and gadgets can isolate children in an unreal fantasy world that can lead to loneliness and unhappiness. Instead, we want children to integrate with children their age in team events, in group activity, and, above all, in conversation.
I have had many memorable conversations with children in the Parliament and at school outreach events, especially at primary schools. The children are often shy, and teachers are too quick to step in to ask the questions or answer for the children. What a joy it is sometimes to be asked by an articulate child an articulate question that inspires a conversation with others on the merits or the lack of merits of certain subjects. Young, articulate children can easily embarrass politicians, and they are a credit to those who parent them and those who teach them. They are the seed of a sustainable, civilised society, and that is why my friend Nanette Milne’s amendment on teachers is so valid in the debate.
I support the statement in the Barnardo’s Scotland briefing that the parenting strategy must include all those who have a parenting role, including the corporate parent. Neil Bibby pointed that out. Looked-after children have some of the worst outcomes in Scotland. In many ways, the parent who needs the most support appears to be the corporate parent. Children without natural parents have so many disadvantages. It is up to a caring Government to ensure that their corporate parent is provided with every possible means of improving the lives of those children and giving them hope for and excitement about their future.
I thoroughly agree with Aileen Campbell’s aspiration to make Scotland the best place in which to bring up children. If she could do something about the weather, it might help.
I support the amendment in the name of my colleague Nanette Milne.
15:08
I start by referring to a point that Dennis Robertson made. He said that he had hoped that the debate would be more consensual. In fact, it has been a consensual debate, because there has been little disagreement. There are a number of points on which we can agree. We all agree on the need for better parenting and the need to support parents who are struggling, and we all agree on the need to support families that are particularly vulnerable.
However, Mr Robertson will recognise that it is understandable that there is a degree of frustration, in that we do not have a strategy to discuss. The headline in the Business Bulletin states that the debate is about the “National Parenting Strategy for Scotland”, but we do not know what that strategy is.
Will the member give way?
Will the member give way?
In a minute.
Mr Henry will take an intervention in a minute.
This is not the launch of the consultation, because that has already taken place. The debate is not about the strategy itself, because we do not know what the strategy is. It seems to be about the aspiration to have a strategy, which we are all signed up to. I therefore question the purpose of what we are doing just now.
Perhaps this is an opportunity for members in the chamber to provide constructive input to the strategy alongside that gathered during the consultation. Is that not a possibility?
There are very well laid-out parliamentary procedures for enabling parliamentarians to have that input. Normally, the Government would go back to a parliamentary committee and have a detailed discussion there. Perhaps that is still to come. In addition, if the issue is so significant, why have no significant proposals been produced for us to respond to and debate fully?
Maureen Watt congratulated the minister on holding a debate on the strategy. We are frustrated, because we do not know what the strategy is and we are looking for detail.
As I said, there are things on which we all agree. There is no doubt about the need for more family centres. I would have liked the opportunity to discuss that and I hope that the minister will still come forward with details of how the Government will expand and develop the role of family centres across Scotland.
I agree with what Mark McDonald said about the role of play. I would like a specific reference to be made—one to which we could respond—to the significant contribution that play makes in nursery education and in families, and to changing the nature of how children learn in primary 1. When we were in power, we had that debate, so that the approach is now more about play-based, experiential development than simply talking at children. Play is significant and we know that children develop through play. It would be good if, in her closing speech, the minister could give us some detail on the role that play will have.
I also hope that in her closing speech the minister will respond positively to the constructive comments that have been made about kinship care and the need for us to see the promised investment. Will we finally hear today how the money will be spent and how the approach will be developed and spread across Scotland?
We also need to hear something specific from the minister in her summing up about the failure not just of the SNP Administration but of the Labour and Liberal Democrat Administration and, at a national level, of the Conservatives to do something about the position of looked-after children. We have all failed looked-after children, and we have all failed in our corporate parenting responsibilities. If only one thing comes out of such debates, it should be that, together, we are all signed up to do something to right a continuing wrong.
I hope that in her summing up the minister will say something specific about the problems in the adoption process that have been highlighted. There are still far too many hurdles and delays placed in the way of potential adoptive parents and children who would benefit from adoption. Many of those are down to bureaucracy rather than ill will. Surely by now we should together have learned about some of the problems that exist and should have responded with arrangements that are more caring and more easily understood for children who require adoption and families and parents who want to adopt.
There is consensus, and all that we are looking for today is some of the detail. I hope that on the specific issues that I have identified we will hear specific details from the minister so that we can all go forward together. The last thing that we need is warm words and platitudes from all parties in the Parliament. What we need is action. That is why I look forward. Just like the minister, I want to be excited about a parenting strategy, but so far I do not know what there is to be excited about. I look forward to the minister in her closing remarks making us all excited.
15:15
Hugh Henry’s closing remarks were certainly quite a challenge—I do not want to disappoint him. I thank all colleagues for their largely helpful contributions. In particular, I congratulate Clare Adamson, who became a stepgranny recently. I assure members that the Scottish Government is committed to ensuring that all families in Scotland receive appropriate, timely support that is based on their needs.
We all acknowledge that bringing up children is a hugely rewarding job and we heard many people talk about their own first-hand experiences as parents, but we also accept that it can be the hardest job that there is. If we are serious about improving outcomes for our children and young people, we need to ensure that parents and carers get the support that they need, when they need it.
I am disappointed that some speakers felt that having an opportunity to help to shape a national strategy was a negative approach. I imagine that if I had published a strategy that they had not been able to feed into, they would have grumbled about that as well. Nevertheless, we all agree that investing in parents is a good thing—not only for children and young people, but for our communities and for the cohesion and productivity of our country. It is part of building a better future for us all.
We have made a good start. We accept—I accept as Minister for Children and Young People—that we have a lot of ground to make up. We need to do more, but we are determined to build on that good start as we move forward, because supporting parents to be the best that they can be and to do the best that they can is one of the most effective ways of improving the health, wellbeing, opportunities and life chances of children and young people.
We also recognise that supporting parents can help to prevent difficult circumstances from escalating or even arising—by making sure that we listen to parents and act on what they tell us. That is one of the key themes that has come through from some of the discussions that I have had with parents. Parents want to feel valued and they need to feel that their voices are being heard.
If parents are equipped and able to nurture their children and give them the love, support and guidance that they need as they grow up, that can help to reduce a whole range of negative outcomes. For that reason, we see our commitment to support for parents as part of our work on prevention and early intervention.
We have plenty of evidence about the importance of parents in reducing crime and offending behaviour. Parents have a key role in developing self-control, reducing the risk of and building resilience to trauma, building strong social bonds and setting appropriate boundaries for behaviour. By improving our support for parents we expect to see positive impacts across a range of outcomes. Supporting parents is good for Scotland, as we all stand to gain, whether or not we have children ourselves.
I turn to specific comments from members, who made valuable contributions to the debate. Clare Adamson made the important point that there is a need to articulate parents’ value to society. I agree absolutely, and I am determined to ensure that the strategy will do that and make us all value parents’ contribution to society a whole lot more.
In an informed speech, Nanette Milne referred to the growing up in Scotland study and the need to tackle some persistent intergenerational problems. We recognise that we need to make sure that there is much more mixing up of society, so that people experience life alongside older people and so that we break the cycle of poverty. We must make sure that parents who, as children, did not have the best start in life are given more tuition to be responsible parents themselves. They can then go on to be good parents and ensure that the persistent cycle of intergenerational social problems is broken. We have an opportunity to do that with the forthcoming children’s bill and with this parenting strategy. I am glad that Nanette Milne made that important point.
Nanette Milne also mentioned the importance of schools for the strategy. I agree absolutely. I note that the curriculum for excellence covers the responsibilities of parenthood. I take on board her points, but I also recognise that teachers now have much more well-rounded training so that, when they have completed their registration, they are able to identify additional needs.
Maureen Watt spoke about the isolation that many new mums feel. The groups that I have met all note the importance of building up networks, making new friends and finding others with common interest. She also spoke of the need to build resilience, which is essential if we want to enable and equip families and communities to find their own solutions.
Dennis Robertson spoke about being a proud Aberdonian, about getting a two-for-one deal when he had his twins and about being a modern man and helping with the nappies. His serious points about coping and normalising the seeking of help were an important part of the debate.
Mark McDonald raised specific issues about post-natal depression and the importance of early diagnosis. Having gone through childbirth myself, I know how difficult it is to have a newborn child and I can only imagine the difficulties that are faced by women who have post-natal depression. We must ensure that we get things absolutely right. He also made points about parental leave. I will happily discuss those issues with him and will factor the nuanced points that he made about parental leave into the strategy and other pieces of work that I am undertaking.
Liam McArthur noted the need for almost a culture change in the way that we view parents and what we must do to ensure that we value good parenting. Along with Hugh Henry, Jamie McGrigor, Malcolm Chisholm and others, he highlighted the real work that we need to do to make sure that we get things right for looked-after children. I do not think that any of us can look at the current statistics without realising that we need to do a lot more. The Education and Culture Committee and others are undertaking good work to articulate the importance of focusing on that group of children.
Nanette Milne made a related point about looked-after children who have not had a good experience of being looked after by the corporate parent. She said that we must ensure that they are able to be good parents themselves when they have families.
Graeme Dey made an important point when he observed that our value as parents is not who we are or what we have, but what we do. Playing and cuddles do not cost anything, and we must get right some of the simple things that we do.
Malcolm Chisholm noted some specific parenting strategies that are on-going throughout Scotland, including the positive parenting programme, the incredible years programme and family-nurse partnerships. He also highlighted the importance of speeding up adoption placements. I agree with that. We all know that, for that particular group of children, better outcomes can be achieved if we can get permanent placements for them earlier.
We are not starting from scratch. As we have heard, lots of really innovative and effective work is already under way throughout Scotland to support some of our most vulnerable parents. Siobhan McMahon and Neil Bibby cited some good practices in their local areas, and Neil Bibby also mentioned Save the Children’s FAST project. I have seen at first hand some great examples of different agencies working in partnership to support parents through schools and prisons, for example. Many of those projects live in the vibrant and vital third sector, to which I pay tribute for the hugely important role that it plays in supporting families throughout Scotland.
Hugh Henry wanted me to mention play specifically. We have taken forward the hugely successful play talk read campaign. I do not know whether he has had an opportunity to visit the campaign bus, but I recommend that he do so. We have also announced money through go play, and support has been provided through grounds for learning to ensure that children have much more access to play opportunities. Given that the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child specifically notes a child’s right to play, a rights-based approach is a fundamental part of how we approach this agenda.
Hugh Henry also wanted me to talk about kinship carers. I gently remind him that no Administration has done more than the current one to recognise kinship carers formally. We will continue to work hard to ensure that they are supported and will continue to lobby Westminster to make sure that it recognises their specific and unique parenting role, just as the Scottish Government has recognised it.
As I said at the start of the debate, it is the Government’s ambition to make Scotland the best place in the world for children to grow up in. I am sure that that ambition is shared by everyone here today. However, it is a journey—we know that we are not there yet and we must create the type of Scotland that we want our children to grow up and flourish in.
Minister, you must conclude, please.
I welcome everyone’s contributions to the parenting strategy and hope that members have valued this opportunity to shape the direction that we are taking in the strategy. This is an important time for us all in Scotland, and this is an important move by the Government that has been widely welcomed by people across Scotland, including the groups that I have met. I hope that, when the strategy is published, it will be welcomed by all members as well.