As members of the National Children's Bureau Health Policy Influencing Group, we publish our Roadmap setting out how to put children at the heart of the NHS.
Babies, children and young people make up around 25% of the population, yet they only account for 11% of NHS expenditure. Children have their own developmental and health needs, separate from those of adults, that are met through a distinct set of services, staffed by a specialised workforce and underpinned by specific legislation. Yet they have never been treated equitably in national or local decision-making.
We must have leadership from the very top that prioritises childhood. The first step will be making babies, children and young people a central pillar of the Health Mission and the forthcoming Ten Year Plan. This must be followed by a greater and more equitable share of health service funding being allocated to children in the multi-year Spending Review in the Spring. Nothing less than this will do.
Our roadmap calls for children to be a central pillar of forthcoming health plans such as the NHS Ten Year Plan, with children advising directly on health policy that affects them. It calls for equitable funding for children, which was lacking in the recent Budget, in particular children with palliative care, long-term conditions, and special educational needs and disabilities, and it calls for Integrated Care Systems (ICSs) to be made accountable for improving set child health outcomes. It is ambitious and yet clear that there are significant, impactful, low-cost steps that the government can take to shift the dial on child health and guarantee that children are not an afterthought when it comes to health policy.
HPIG is committed to working with the government, NHS England and ICSs to implement our roadmap and ensuring that improving child health and the services they rely on is a priority.
