Children First Campaign – latest news

Our change.org petition can be found here and latest news is shown below, in reverse chronological order.


01/05/20 – we sent out the 4th issue of our Childhood in Crisis Newsletter to all MPs and selected peers, to all supporters on change.org and to signatories of the petition.

30/04/20 – we received terrible news that our Founder and Lead Spokesman, Steve Franks, died today after a battle with COVID-19.


Further digital coverage is available here:

https://inews.co.uk/news/health/children-first-alliance-new-cabinet-minister-national-emergency-817219

https://inews.co.uk/opinion/comment/children-first-cabinet-minister-opinion-welfare-health-social-media-evils-house-of-commons-817218

01/04/20 – we sent out the 3rd issue of our Childhood in Crisis Newsletter to all MPs and selected peers, to all supporters (via change.org) to signatories of the petition.

02/03/20 – The second Childhood in Crisis Newsletter was sent by email to all MPs and selected peers, and to all supporters on our mailing list. Additionally, we sent an update out via change.org to signatories of the petition.

28/01/20 – The first Childhood in Crisis Newsletter was produced and circulated. The target audience for this bulletin is political – all MPs and some peers. It contained links to articles, evidence and news affecting the health and wellbeing of children and young people.

17/12/19 – update sent out to supporters and also, on 02/01/20, to Change.org signatories

Healthy Holiday Meals project

The Children First Alliance is determined to be about actions, not just words.

You will no doubt have seen reports about holiday hunger. Hard-pressed families struggle during the school holidays when free school meals are unavailable and those in work on low pay also have to cope with child care costs. Government has at least recognised there is a problem and have some very limited pilot projects in place to run for two years however many of the most affected areas had their bids turned down. We have therefore committed to pilot projects of our own where the need is greatest in Tower Hamlets, North Bristol and Blackpool for the 2020 summer holidays.

We will shortly begin a fundraising drive to finance these projects. Individual donations from £500 and donations from organisations from £4,000 will be sought. We will contact you again about this. If you are interested in becoming a sponsor I would be happy to brief you more fully. If you are considering making a charitable donation over Christmas please consider this. For organisations, this would be an excellent way to fulfil your CSR commitment.

In support of this initiative our President, Baroness (Frances) D’Souza, is introducing a Private Members Bill requiring Government to address the problem nationally.

Childhood in Crisis Newsletter

We will shortly begin to circulate a regular and frequent newsletter to all MPs. As you know, negative stories about child health and wellbeing come thick and fast. We will also share the newsletters with you. We need to bring this to the attention of policy-makers persistently to drive the issue up their agenda. We will be asking for their support by tabling questions and motions in Parliament and by seeking debates on these matters. If you would like to write to your constituency MP or others you or your organisation have connections to we would be happy to help.

The Prime Minister

Yesterday we wrote to the Prime Minister (following on from our letter to him before the election) asking him to appoint a Cabinet Minister for child health and wellbeing. We will keep you updated.

Another Private Members Bill?

We have drafted a PMB requiring Government to incorporate the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child into domestic law. We are currently seeking an MP to table this Bill. If you can help to identify a willing Parliamentarian please let us know.

Speaking at Conferences

Recently our leading spokesman Steve Franks spoke at the What’s on 4 Kids awards ceremony and our campaign manager Phil Royal spoke at the Towards a Child Friendly City Conference. We would be happy to provide a speaker for further Conferences.

The new Government

In the previous Parliament progress was difficult. The agenda was swamped with rows over Brexit and with no clear majority politicians were consumed by political considerations. Like it or loathe it, the new Government has a clear majority and will be better able to focus on other matters. We will be increasing our efforts on behalf of child health and wellbeing and we will keep you informed more frequently from now on.

In October 2019, we were featured in iNews 21st Oct Children First Editorial about our campaign in the iNews. This superb coverage is a major breakthrough in bringing to the fore the many challenges to the health and


July 2019 – We wrote to new Prime Minister Boris Johnson and received a courteous and thoughtful reply from Jo Churchill MP, the Health Minister for Prevention, Public Health and Primary Care. Our reply to her, setting out the evidence and requesting a meeting, is here.


Find out more about the Children First Campaign