Agenda item

Report of the Director of Children’s and Education Services

Cabinet considered a report of the Director of Children’s Services and Education that sought approval of the receipt of the Best Start Family Hubs and Healthy Babies Programme Grant for April 2026 to March 2029, and associated spend.

The Council currently operated 8 Family Hubs to deliver place-based integrated offers to families across the city, including the offer from the buildings, through an outreach community model and a new digital offer.

Coventry City Council was selected as one of 75 Local Authorities to join the national Family Hub and Start for Life Programme, covering the period April 2022 to March 2025 (first 1001 days), including financial investment to strengthen its offer to babies, children and families, building on its previous achievements. The Programme was then extended for a further year, covering April 2025 to March 2026.

The Programme had already received £6m of grant funding from the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and the Department for Education (DfE) across the 4 years 2022/23 to 2025/26 to deliver the Programme objectives. Coventry was also formally recognized as a trailblazer in this approach, one of only 13 sites across England, and had received many national ministerial and governmental visits and had contributed to national evaluations.

The Programme had been governed by a Family Hub Programme Board, supporting the work of 7 workstreams to ensure that all the national minimum expectation, and most of the “go furthers”, of the framework were delivered within the Coventry Family hub offer, in line with the MOU associated with this grant.  An annual review report was provided, as well as regular updates, to the Cabinet Member for Children and Young people, the Health and Wellbeing Board, and other forums on request.

Further funding had now been allocated to Coventry for financial years 2026/27 to 2028/29, with a provisional allocation of £6,117,000, subject to the Council meeting the current Programme expectations up to March 2026 and the signing of a new Memorandum of Understanding to formalise the agreement to meet the new Programme expectations. Cabinet was requested to accept receipt of the grant into the local authority and associated spend, in order to deliver the Family Hub Offer in line with the Programme Guidance.

RESOLVED that Cabinet recommends that Council:

1)  Accepts the grant funding and agrees planned associated spend for the purposes outlined in the report in respect of the Best Start Family Hubs and Healthy Babies Programme for the financial years 2026/27, 2027/28, and 2028/29.

2)  Delegates authority to the Director of Children’s Services and Education, following consultation with the Director of Finance and Resources (S151 Officer) and the Director of Law and Governance, to enter into the necessary legal agreements to accept the funding.

3)  Delegates the authority to the Director of Children’s Services and Education to grant funding to third parties in line with Programme expectations.

4)  Continues to agree that future reports on this grant and the Best Start Family Hub Programme are received by the Cabinet Member with responsibility for Children’s Services.