Extra funding to improve childhood communication
Extra money will target childhood communication problems
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Tuesday, 08, Jul 2008 04:52
The government has committed £52 million to tackle communication problems in children after a review found that services need to improve across the country.
A total of £40 million will enable those working with pre-school children to access training and materials to support young children's early language development.
And a further £12 million has been set aside to bring about the specific recommendations of the Bercow Review.
This looked at over 2,000 comments, about half of which were from parents, on how services could improve for children and young people with problems ranging from severe speech and language impairments to a vocabulary limited by social reasons, such as a family background where communication between family members is limited.
The review found that, across the country, services and the capacity of the children's workforce needs to improve and much more needs to be done to join up services at a local level.
It calls on government to raise the profile of children with communication difficulties amongst local authorities and primary care trusts as well as in wider society.
Children's secretary Ed Balls and health secretary Alan Johnson said the government would address the report's recommendations in an implementation plan in the autumn.
"There is already money in the system to make some of these improvements - the challenge is to make sure it is being used properly," said Mr Balls.
"We will also contribute £12 million nationally to make sure the recommendations can be taken forward quickly, as well as £40 million for pre-school children, and we will publish a detailed action plan in the autumn."
Mr Johnson added: "Over the last ten years, we have increased the number of therapists by over 38 per cent and improved access to professional programmes to help children overcome early speech problems.
"But we recognise more needs to be done. Today's report will support commissioners in their role of identifying local need and buying appropriate services to ensure that help in communicating it is available when it is needed."