Child Poverty Strategy

David Williams Excerpts

Monday 8th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for the work she does in this important area. As she knows, parents will save up to £500 a year as a result of the plans we have set out for action on baby formula so that parents can make the right choices for themselves. Of course, we know that it is also important to put in place support for parents who wish to breastfeed, and that is why we have also extended and expanded the national breastfeeding helpline, which runs alongside support that will be available in Best Start family hubs to ensure that mothers have choices about the right approach for them to make. I will ensure that a Minister in the Department of Health and Social Care writes to the hon. Lady to update her on the issues she has asked about.

[David Williams (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)]

The removal of the two-child limit is welcome news, and in my constituency it will lift well over 4,000 kids out of poverty. I saw at first hand how 14 years of austerity left families in Stoke-on-Trent and Kidsgrove in crisis. Early support was taken away, and we now have among the highest numbers of kids living in poverty anywhere in the country. Does the Secretary of State agree that we must also start to build back that local, personalised family support—for example, through our family hubs, which were absolutely decimated under the previous Conservative Government?

[Bridget Phillipson]

I agree with my hon. Friend, and I know from previous conversations that he worked in a Sure Start centre and was involved in the delivery of those services. Best Start family hubs will draw on what we know works from Sure Start. The evaluation evidence is incredibly clear about the impact they had on children’s life chances, on admissions to hospital and on the increase in exam grades that we saw of children who lived near to a centre. That is why we have committed to funding all local authorities to deliver Best Start family hubs, backed up by £500 million to help families in every part of the country. That roll-out will create 1,000 Best Start family hubs nationwide by the end of 2028, supporting parents and backing children. That will ensure that we reduce the longer-term impacts we see when parents do not have the support they need and when children have to wait too long for the support they deserve, and it will reduce all the devastation that has followed from that short-sighted decision taken back in 2010 by the previous Government to remove funding from Sure Start.

Giving Every Child the Best Start in Life

David Williams Excerpts

Monday 7th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

Is it not fascinating that so many Conservative Members are suddenly taking a keen interest in support for children with SEND? The hon. Gentleman blithely says, “Whatever the challenges of the SEND system—”, but they are challenges that the Conservatives left behind, and they are challenges that this Labour Government will rise to. There will always be a legal right to the additional support that children with SEND need, and we will protect it. Alongside that, however, will be a better system, with strengthened support, improved access and more funding, something that the Conservatives failed to provide in 14 years. They left a terrible mess behind—families and children were failed—and a degree of humility and understanding from any of them would take us a great deal further along the way. If they do not want to be constructive and if they continue to duck the necessary decisions, we will confront those decisions and ensure that all our children are able to achieve and thrive, something in which they showed no interest.

[David Williams (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)]

Today is a really proud moment for me, because 20 years ago I worked for our brilliant Sure Start centres in Stoke-on-Trent. I saw at first hand the way they completely transformed the lives of families in my area. I then saw the terrible removal of family support by the Conservatives in the austerity years—they left more kids in poverty and more living in care. Can the Secretary of State outline how the roll-out of more family hubs will improve school readiness and help to lower the number of kids living in poverty and in care in my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent North and Kidsgrove?

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend saw at first hand the difference that Sure Start made. Through his election to this place, a new generation of children in his constituency will once again benefit from the kind of support that was so essential, and we will support his local authority with additional funding for that. He is right to say that this is about children growing up in poverty and the wider failures in our children’s social care system. That is why I am so proud that, thanks to the actions of a Labour Government, more children will receive free school meals through the expansion of eligibility to all families in receipt of universal credit.

Alongside that, we will deliver the biggest reform in a generation to children’s social care, to make sure that families are better supported to stay together where they can, with early help and targeted intervention. Where that is not possible, we will make sure that our most vulnerable children do not see wholly inadequate and terrible placements that fail to deliver the kind of support that we would expect for our own children. That is the difference that a Labour Government will make.

School-based Nursery Capital Grants

David Williams Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd April 2025 Commons Chamber

[David Williams (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)]

We started out with six Conservative Members, which we can divide by two to get the number now left on their Benches. Given their track record in this field, perhaps the rest have been put in detention for the rest of the day.

I am so proud to see that Smallthorne primary academy in my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent North and Kidsgrove has been selected for a new school-based nursery. Does the Secretary of State agree with me that these nurseries are vital in places such as Smallthorne, not only for the childcare they provide, but for helping with school-readiness, closing the developmental gap early on and giving every single child the best start in life?

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right about the difference that early years provision makes, not just in those crucial early years but right throughout children’s lives. The evidence could not be clearer. I am delighted that, in Smallthorne and in many communities across our country, more children will have the opportunity to benefit from high-quality early years provision, which is critical to their life chances and also really important for parents in his constituency.