Government announces £500m project to provide single point of access for health, education and wellbeing services
One-stop shop family hubs will be rolled out across England to give parents advice and support, the government has announced. The centres will offer help with breastfeeding and housing issues, as well as supporting children’s early development and language, ministers said.
The £500m project will open 1,000 centres from April 2026, meaning every council in England will have a family hub by 2028. It will build on the existing family hubs and start for life programme to provide a single point of access for services in health, education and wellbeing.
Parents will also be able to register births, access midwifery and maternity services, and get help to stop smoking. There will also be activities for children under five and youth service provision.
The education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, said the hubs would provide a “lifeline of consistent support across the nation, ensuring health, social care and education work in unison to ensure all children get the very best start in life”.
The policy forms part of the government’s push to replace services lost since 2010, which include the closure of more than 1,400 Sure Start centres.
Research showed that children who lived near a Sure Start centre for their first five years were more likely to get five good GCSE grades at age 16. Family hubs were originally opened in 75 local authority areas at the start of 2024 by the then Conservative government.
The announcement by the Department for Education comes ahead of the government unveiling its strategy on child development on Monday. The Giving Every Child the Best Start in Life plan will lay out how ministers hope to improve the development of children under five, and give support to parents and wider families.
Phillipson said: “It’s the driving mission of this government to break the link between a child’s background and what they go on to achieve – our new Best Start Family Hubs will put the first building blocks of better life chances in place for more children. I saw firsthand how initiatives like Sure Start helped level the playing field in my own community, transforming the lives of children by putting in place family support in the earliest years of life, and as part of our Plan for Change, we’re building on its legacy for the next generation of children. Making sure hard-working parents are able to benefit from more early help is a promise made, and promise kept – delivering a lifeline of consistent support across the nation, ensuring health, social care and education work in unison to ensure all children get the very best start in life.”
Anna Feuchtwang, chief executive of the National Children’s Bureau: “The prime minister’s plan for change sets out his ambition to improve outcomes in early childhood. Now the government has put its money where its mouth is and committed to rolling out Best Start Family Hubs in every local authority. With indications of a funding boost for babies and young children already included in the 10-year health plan, I am delighted to see children and families being given clear priority in government spending decisions.”
Conservative shadow education secretary Laura Trott criticised the announcement, and said it “brings little clarity on what’s genuinely new and what simply rebrands existing services”.
She added: “That lack of clarity is part of a wider pattern. This is a government defined by broken promises and endless U-turns.”
