Tag: UK Government Strategy Update 0 items

Nick Clegg, Deputy Prime Minister has set up a Childhood and Families Task Force, chaired by the Prime Minister, and made up of senior Ministers from across Government departments, including Nick Clegg.

Out of five proposals, play is number 4.

“Fourth, every parent understands the importance of a secure environment for their children. Spaces where they can play, where they can feel completely free, where they can safely push at the boundaries, learning and experimenting. Places where different generations can meet, binding the community together… If you ask adults if they used to play near their homes as children, 71% will tell you they did. Every single day. That compares to just 21% of children now. It’s not right, and it has to change. But, despite how obvious that is, I do appreciate that there’s no easy answer.

It isn’t up to central government to start handpicking the areas where children across the country should play. Given the lack of money in the Treasury’s coffers, we wouldn’t now be able to do that, even if we wanted to. But isn’t that even more reason to get the Task Force looking at this? There’s no more money to throw at these problems, and even when there was money, Labour didn’t fix them.
So we have to be innovative, we have to find new solutions. No, we need to work out how we can empower people to deliver these changes in their own neighbourhoods… By giving councils more power over how they spend their money.. By giving communities more control over what gets built in their neighbourhoods… And by making it easier for volunteers and charities to get involved”.