The politics of early interventions

In a joint Scottish Government and COSLA policy statement we are told that transformational change will come through a focus on early years and early interventions (GIRFEC) and may take a generation to complete. The joint effort by Government and public services will lead to increasing sustainable economic growth.

In other words, developing a complex economy, fit for the 21st century, is simply a matter of  targeting the very young via public services which are morphing more and more into public/private partnerships.  Unfortunately, some people are not going to live long enough to see the transformational change and sustainable economic growth - whatever that is - and will have to take this unbelievable statement on trust. 

"We have always known the earliest years of life are crucial to a child`s development. However, it is increasingly evident that it is in the first years of life that inequalities in health, education and employment opportunities are passed from one generation to another. The early years framework signals local and national government`s joint commitment to break this cycle through prevention and early intervention. In short we aim to give every child in Scotland the best start in life."

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/215889/0057733.pdf

 It gets even more banal for `all you need is love`: "Research informs us that a child's first attachments are vitally important - he or she needs to feel loved and special. Children whose needs have been met in a sensitive, loving and timely way by their primary carer - described as secure attachment - have a sense of trust and confidence in themselves. Securely attached children do better at school and are likely to be good at making friends. Their early attachments help them to form close relationships later in life. They grow up knowing that when they need something someone will help them."
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2012/06/5565/8 In order to prop up failing parents who go on to recycle poverty, part of the Scottish government strategy was launched at the end of 2010 with plenty of opportunities for joined up working and data sharing amongst state `carers`. In addition, the national Pre-Birth to Three guidance, referred to improved evidence-based practice: "Informed by the latest developments in neuroscience, this new national guidance recognises the importance of pregnancy and the first years of life in influencing children’s future development and outcomes. This recognition of the importance of brain development pre-birth and in children’s earliest years, supports early years staff in their practice and is a unique approach for Scotland." [Not really. See below]

Supporting the Scottish government’s 10-year vision to improve the lives of children and families, the resource supports the principles and values of key Scottish government policy, such as the Early Years Framework, Equally Well, Achieving our Potential, Getting it right for every child and Curriculum for Excellence.
http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/earlyyearsmatters/p/genericcontent_tcm4658413.asp GIRFEC, Curriculum for Excellence, joined up working and other collaboratives, the eCare framework to facilitate data sharing, and more, are all being built up in Scotland to accommodate an altered view of children and society and their micro-management by the state. But supposing the Scottish Government has got it wrong? `Policy Briefing: The Biologisation of Poverty, Policy and Practice in Early Years Intervention.` (January 06 2014) - a two year research project into these matters - suggests they have done just that. [pdf] Findings from our research into brain science and early years intervention as part of the Faraday Institute’s Uses and Abuses of Biology programme reveal that this biologisation of poverty reinforces social divisions and obscures inequalities...  Poverty is seamlessly conflated with poor parenting through an assumption that disadvantaged mothers are neglectful.

For example, the Government commissioned Independent Review into Child Poverty and Life Chances, in 2010 concluded ‘the development of a baby’s brain is affected by the attachment to their parents’ and that brain growth is ‘significantly reduced’ in inadequately parented children. Similarly, the Allen Reports on early intervention (2011) called for urgent Government action on the basis that ‘brain architecture’ is set during the first years, inside and outside the womb, with the ‘wrong type’ of parenting profoundly affecting children’s ‘emotional wiring’ through into adulthood. This deterministic message is softened through an optimistic focus on ‘up-skilling’ parents and thereby enacting biological change. Cycles of deprivation, it is claimed, can be broken simply by teaching poor mothers how to love their babies more effectively. ...

Despite the eugenic resonance of such reasoning, the emphasis on love and its transformational benefits to children constructs a veneer of progressive benevolence. Politicians from every political party, social commentators from across the political spectrum, professionals and practitioners, and children’s charities have all rallied around the cause of early intervention.

Last year MPs published the cross-party manifesto 1001 Critical Days: The Importance of the Conception to Age Two Period which, essentially, called for greater surveillance of pregnant women and mothers of young children. 
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This misappropriation of brain science extends right across the health, education and social care sectors and has seeped into the family courts system. In 2011 the Director of the Association of Children’s Services attributed a sharp increase in the numbers of children taken into care to ‘a better understanding of the physical damage to brain development associated with poor parenting’.

http://www.discoversociety.org/policy-briefing-the-biologisation-of-poverty-policy-and-practice-in-early-years-intervention/