childrens centre attracting the wrong kind of mothers

[Morph2]

i'm not BU as i'm not too bothered (more disappointed) about the decision but others are very angry. Local surestart (only built last year) ran a group for walking to school age every week. Has been scrapped due to funding issues (ok i understand that its a recession after all).

HV unofficially told my friend the decision was because the session was "attracting the wrong kind of mothers". We've started attending another session run by the council which is abit of a trek away (they have started to charge a £1 a session but its worth it, i drive so i can get there), and when i filled out my new started form i had to tick (for monitoring purposes) if i was in one of the groups they specified, i wasn't so i didn't tick, just thinking maybe if enough people don't tick this session will be stopped too :(

I've not read all the threads since I posted but can I just say this...

NCT activities such as Bumps & Babies groups are usually very low cost or a voluntary donation. They should be accessible to all. You do not need to do the antenatal classes or be a member to join any activity with the exception of branch meetings or members' only welcome evenings

I have organised or promoted some events for my local NCT including meet ups at playgrounds and cafes, free taster sessions for baby massage, postnatal check ups (we ask for a small deposit to make sure people turn up) and paid classes for a few pounds but free to anyone on benefits. But can we get anyone to turn up? The classes and taster sessions almost always run with spaces although I'm hopeful a new regular group with have more interest.

I really think the lower/middle/upper thing is very outdated it was invented for a census i dont think families fit into these boxes anymore

I think it is easy to think lower/middle etc don't matter if you are in a position of privilege. Yes they are categories where lots of peopel fit in between the two and there are lots of anomalies, but that doesn't mean that class doesn't matter

i am not pivelaged at all and have been very poor I do not think we should classify ourselves with a word or way of life ,

Some children don't have acess to toys full stop, let alone educational toys.

If you have a shape sorter, a wooden puzzle and a little slide in your garden then you are doing better than a lot of people.

I think it's vital that the children who need help should get it, and I totally agree with the poster who said it's the sharp elbowed MC thing.

Research has shown that the more you 'target' an intervention, the more likely you are inadvertantly to exclude/overlook the most truly 'hard to reach'.

And has anyone yet mader the point that being slotted into one of those so-called 'target groups' is both divisive and disempowering? My local CC (unbeknownst to me at the time) was being criticised by the Powers That Be for not reaching local ethnic minorities... and thereby made me (as white British as they come but with mixed race DCs with 'forrin' names) visibly and embarrassingly more welcome to the group than my equally white neighbour with her blonde little daughter Ava, and thereby incensed my (English as second language yet 110% bilingual) DH by suggesting that my DCs may need help with their language. They then pissed me off by getting all enthused that they could tick a box on account of my rare medical condition... sorry dears, being this ill as a parent may boost your stats but I don't enjoy it...

Oops, pressed send too soon. I meant to continue... I therefore no longer 'engage' with their services and enjoy instead the local toddler groups. Am I thereby 'hard to reach' or 'too middle class'? One could see it either way. The targets take on a life of their own.

When they were first set up, we were all encouraged to use CCs as much as possible. The idea was to make them as indispensable and part of life as schools were so that future governments would have a very hard job to get rid of them.

It was planned to have a CC in every community, tailored to the needs of that community.

That's where the access to all comes from.

Things have now changed. Funding has been reduced and we have a Government that wants to target CC services towards those that are perceived to need them most. As I said earlier, we should not be surprised about this: they did say that's what they would do if elected.

CCs and Surestart have attracted criticism for years that they are being monopolised by the middle classes and are not reaching those that really need them. We have those critics, the Daily Mail and their ilk, to thank for the current state of affairs.

I suppose it boils down to what we really want from Surestart and the CCs. And how we plan to fund it all.

We don't have a children's' centre where I live (before a load of posters tell me this can't be I can assure you it is the case). This means that playgroups run by the church are always over subscribed and they attract a good social mix. Their policy is first come, first served so anyone can attend. In reality being a church group you have to tolerate a certain amount of talk about Jesus and they sing hymns at the end so I would love a children's centre nearby where we could go and play and just be parents without any agenda.

Social isolation, PND and good old fashioned loneliness can affect any mother regardless of how much money or how many plastic slides or educational toys they have. The effects can be devastating and cause problems that then cost other publicly funded services more than early intervention would cost.

Do we really, really want to see classes where it's just those from "deprived" areas? Many social problems are the result of segregation. Bad news for everyone.

I would add that I think DC and GO would like nothing better than to get rid of these flagships of the last Labour government. They are expensive and don't fit in at all with their plans for children's services. I think they see them as a huge waste of money.

Footprints - yes, I think you are right that the coalition govt. are trying to damn the welfare state by making it just something for 'them' - the sort of people the Mail loves to portray as feckless scroungers. There used to be a social contract in this country - born out of the shared experience of WW2, where people of all backgrounds had mixed very closely indeed in the forces and at work. There was a shared determination to build a better country, with decent housing for all, decent education for all (including university education), decent healthcare for all. Part of this contract was that the welfare state was for everyone - everyone paid in and everyone would get help when they needed it.

Now the coalition is taking that apart, hoping that those who are better off and find their child benefit disappearing will start to resent paying taxes for the 'others'. (And there's a whole other issue about taking money away from women...)

I do not want to see segregation, however the presence of confident, affluent mothers who can be perceived as looking down their noses at the targeted families do prevent those in the most need getting help.

In the past I have run groups which were quite heavily targeted with some self selection that fed into groups that were run for anyone, again funded by the CC. Our hope was that parents who lacked the confidence or knowledge to attend a busy mother and toddler group would attend my group, buddy up and gradually graduate to a less targeted group.

Do people really begrudge this kind of support?

Where are 'middle class' mums supposed to go? I'm genuinely by this thread.

"the presence of confident, affluent mothers who can be perceived as looking down their noses at the targeted families do prevent those in the most need getting help."

This is why segregation is a bad thing. It's the stereotyping and perpetuation of these negative stereotypes that will only be broken down by mixing.

Nobody on this thread (that I've noticed) begrudges the support of children's centres. Quite the opposite. This support is vital and needed by all.

bisjo I suspect the MC mums are supposed to meet for coffee in their semis

What would cost more, a parent being able to join these groups or treating a mum through PND.

I think any parent should be able to access these groups

KM that may well be true but how do you get to meet other mums to invite if you aren't allowed out? I used to go to what apparently is now a sure start centre to get ds weighed and we had weekly talks. Other than that I'd take him out for walks. No real opportunities to meet anyone if I hadn't gone to the sure start centre.

I think it is a good thing to try and break down social divides, however the parents I was working with needed their own needs to be met before they become part of a social experiment, no matter how well meaning.

In time they would go to more socially mixed groups , some of which were run by CC.

Yes that's my point bisjo. Sorry I thought it was clear from my posts what my position is on this: that assumptions about any group, whether it's middle class mums having spacious homes or the money to pay for help, or poorer families being put off by the sight of a designer handbag are unhelpful and often just plain wrong. Being a new mum is a great leveller. Neither your body nor your baby cares what class you are and social and health problems are the same whether your household income is £12,000 or £120,000.

Besides, I'm middle class but I still live in a tiny house and our household income is about the same as the average income for two earners. So I can't afford a cleaner every week or to pay a private lactation consultant because there's no NHS breastfeeding service open near me for the next fortnight, or the luxury of a maternity nurse or other help when I have my baby. Nor can i host 5 mums and babies. And yet the assumption is that I can and will pay.

Fortunately not everyone needs the help offered by targeted groups at children's centres. The parents at my groups were mainly victims of domestic violence, mothers of sexually abused children, recovering alcoholics and drug addicts and women whose children had previously been in care or were in danger of doing so. These women needed specialist support and felt judged by women they perceived to be more affluent. Often they were right in that assumption

As I have said it is not really about class , which is really an out of date classification anyway .

Ideally a CC should have some groups open to all, and other groups that are targeted.

katie- health problems ARE very closely related to income

you just have to look at the disparity in life expectancies to see that very clearly

Some health conditions are yes, that's true Margery. But the issues that affect women post birth are not. Even breastfeeding take up is dependent on women wanting to start in the first place, usually a pre-birth decision.

I've been writing grant applicantions recently and the only evidence I have found regarding PND and socio-economic status was from the USA that showed African American women were more predisposed to developing PND. However, other ethnic groups more likely to be poor in the states such as Hispanics did not show such a predisposition. There was no evidence from any studies i read that socio-economic status or race in the UK or Europe made any difference.

I should point out I don't equate race with socio-economic status - it's just this particular study showed a link and I believe (although I'm no expert) that African Americans are more likely to be of a lower socio-economic status in a way we don't see as much in the UK. But my point is I could only find the one study and it wasn't UK.