Child Poverty Priorities 2011

OneKingston Child Poverty Strategy 2011-2014 Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames KINGSTON CHILD POVERTY PRIORITIES

PRIORITY 1:

REDUCE HOUSING RELATED POVERTY to ensure families have sustainable accommodation arrangements and the child’s environment supports them to thrive

We will be successful if we:  Reduce the number of children living in temporary accommodation  Increase the stock of social / affordable housing  Prioritise families to live in Decent Homes  Ensure homes are warmer and easier and cheaper to heat  Provide joined up advice on housing PRIORITY 2:

FOCUS ACTION LOCALLY and foster community aspiration and decision-making

We will be successful if we:  Enable local services and coordinated actions  Achieve local ownership of issues, identification of solutions and socially entrepreneurial developments.  Give children and young people more opportunities to influence decisions about their local area  Promote and support the voluntary and community sector in addressing the needs of children living in poverty PRIORITY 3:

IMPROVE TO EMPLOYMENT AND so that more families are in andACCESS foster community aspiration andSKILLS decision-making work that pays and have support to progress

We will be successful if we:  Reduce the number of workless households  Remove barriers to work, including lack of spoken English, literacy and numeracy skills  Provide parent friendly routes back to work including access to volunteering opportunities  Increase opportunities for young people to enter employment  Increase take up of training and skills development by parents, targeted at gaps in the local labour market  Ensure parents living in poverty can access quality and affordable childcare

PRIORITY 4:

MAXIMISE FAMILY INCOME so that financial support is responsive to families’ situations

We will be successful if we:  Increase benefit take up  Increase take up of free school meal entitlement  Enable more families to be financially literate  Provide more families with access to information and advice to support them to deal with personal debt  Increase the ability of children and young people to plan and manage their money  Tackle in work poverty with partners taking responsibility for own employees

PRIORITY 5:

ENABLE CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE TO LEAD HEALTHY LIFE STYLES and become healthy parents with healthy children

We will be successful if we:  Reduce health inequalities and in mental health  Promote good health before and during pregnancy  Promote children and parents’ emotional health and well-being  Think Lean – more children and families engage in healthy eating and physical activities  Further reduce under 18 conceptions and enhance support for teenage parents  Reduce substance and alcohol misuse by families living in poverty

PRIORITY 6:

ENSURE Partnership around the family giving every child the best start in life and intervening early

We will be successful if we:  Focus support on families with children 0-5 years living in poverty  Intervene early at every stage of a child’s life  Ensure that parents who require support in their parenting are able to access appropriate parenting classes  Enhance parenting skills for young people  Identify and remove barriers to access for parents whose first language is not English  Ensure smooth information sharing arrangements result in clear referral pathways and access to service  Work closely and proactively together to tackle the causes and effects of poverty

PRIORITY 7:

RAISE ASPIRATIONS OF THE NEXT GENERATION so that poverty in childhood does not translate into poor experiences and outcomes

We will be successful if we:  Improve children’s attainment levels at all key stages  Further narrow attainment gaps for those on free school meals  Increase the number of children on FSM who progress to HE, FE or take up apprenticeships  Decrease the number of young people dropping out of education or training at age 17  Enhance children’s positive attitudes to learning and high self esteem  Ensure all children have the opportunity to participate in positive activities