Louise Bazalgette, Nesta

The scrapping of the two-child limit is a much-needed change to turn the tide on child poverty.

It is also the most cost-effective way of lifting children out of poverty.

The Children’s Booker prize will tell kids that they matter As the number of children reading for pleasure hits a record low, the new award highlights its importance for wellbeing, and will give away thousands of books

I’m excited for the Children’s Booker prize ❤️. It will be very helpful to me as a parent to get ideas for books my kids will enjoy www.theguardian.com/books/2025/o...

Love’s Labour ‘A work of genius… It would not be humanly possible for me to recommend his work more highly’ India Knight ‘Left me feeling wiser and more open to life’ Oliver Burkeman Luminous and necessary stories...

Love’s Labour by Stephen Grosz (published last month) is my new favourite book! Beautifully written, full of empathy, amazing human stories & so much wisdom and life experience ❤️ I would recommend it to anyone, particularly if you enjoy reading about psychoanalysis www.penguin.co.uk/books/420372...

Crowds gather in London for ‘unite the kingdom’ march featuring Tommy Robinson – UK politics live March expected to be Britain’s largest far-right rally in decades, and will include speakers from Britain, the US and Europe

I shared a train with people on the way to this march. They were drunk at 9:30am, wearing union jack flags and swearing loudly and behaving intimidatingly around young children. What does that have to do with national pride? www.theguardian.com/politics/liv...

The London where I was born and grew up is a place that is stronger for its diversity. Cities bring people from all kinds of backgrounds into close proximity and that can help foster curiosity, open-mindedness and shared respect. That is my London, not the far-right march happening today 😔

Today is international left handers day. My six year old is very excited about this 👋❤️

The deadline to respond to our call for evidence is 27th August 💡

Identifying impactful programmes to support parenting and the home learning environment in the early years We are assessing the evidence for parenting and home learning environment programmes to identify all programmes available in the UK that have robust evidence of impact on child outcomes

We have just launched a new call for evidence @nestauk.bsky.social 💥We’ll be carrying out a rapid critical appraisal to identify programmes that support parenting and the home learning environment that have robust evidence of impact on child outcomes. More info here www.nesta.org.uk/project-upda...

😯

South Gaza: Tents, Food & Water **With Famine on the rise, we will significantly lower tent purchases and focus on food (rice and bread) and water over the next couple of weeks**

If you’re seeing reports of famine in Gaza and feeling really powerless, here is a fundraising effort to respond to this crisis: The Sameer Project chuffed.org/project/1132... I’ve just donated and hope some more children will be fed as a result 🙏 So painful seeing what’s happening

Thank you @eleanorire.bsky.social it was great to hear your thoughts on this important topic. I’m looking forward to continuing the conversation about building a shared research agenda

How can we achieve a step change in access to effective parenting support? Hear about our new analysis of the market for parenting interventions. We’ll highlight the need for a concentrated effort to strengthen the market of parenting support, and recommendations on how to d...

Join us tomorrow for our event! www.nesta.org.uk/event/how-ca...

One-stop family hubs to be opened in all English council areas Government announces £500m project to provide single-point of access for health, education and wellbeing services

Children growing up in our country deserve the best start in life.

Building on the legacy of Sure Start, we’re opening Best Start Family Hubs in every local authority.

That’s the difference Labour makes.
www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

One-stop family hubs to be opened in all English council areas Government announces £500m project to provide single-point of access for health, education and wellbeing services

Such fantastic news that the Government will be funding family hubs in every local authority in England www.theguardian.com/society/2025... Evaluation of Sure Start has shown family support in the early years supports better long-term outcomes for children, so this is such an important investment

Parenting support at scale: market analysis Nesta examines the market for parenting support services for families with children under the age of five

Evidence shows that parenting programmes have a positive impact on babies and young children's development - but they're not reaching enough families.

Today, we're publishing new research on the market for parenting interventions, based on our analysis of 135 programmes across the UK ⤵️

You could manage very well without a spoon!

To make gains on child development we need to start with parents - CYP Now Children’s relationships with their parents and caregivers are one of the most crucial influences on their emotional and social development - and success in school.

To make gains on early childhood development, we need to start with parents www.cypnow.co.uk/content/blog...

Parenting support at scale: market analysis Nesta examines the market for parenting support services for families with children under the age of five

Today we launch our @nestauk.bsky.social report ‘Parenting Support at Scale: Market Analysis’. We find that parenting support is a really effective strategy for supporting child development. But we need to fund the most effective programmes and we need more of it! www.nesta.org.uk/report/paren...

Scaling effective and accessible parenting programmes will be key for improving child development outcomes - one of the government's key priorities.

Join us Wed 9 July for a lunchtime webinar sharing insights from three online parenting programmes. Register to attend: bit.ly/4n5cd5n

The healthy food standard is a win for the nation’s health The UK government has announced a healthy food standard to improve the healthiness of the food we buy. Here’s why we think it’s a good idea.

Yesterday @rthonwesstreeting.bsky.social ‬announced a new healthy food standard.

It’s about small changes rather than big, unsustainable shifts - like two-for-one offers on baked rather than fried crisps.

Read more about the policy from Nesta’s Hugo Harper: www.nesta.org.uk/blog/the-hea...

New report 📢 To find out more about how Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hubs work, we commissioned @tcru-ucl.bsky.social and @newcastleuni.bsky.social to carry out an evaluation of MASH - with funding from DfE 🔎

Read the report: foundations.org.uk/our-work/publications/multi-agency-safeguarding-hubs/

In my strength class yesterday, my coach said “how was that? are you going to add any more?” I said “I don’t know, that felt pretty heavy.” 🏋️‍♂️ The woman next to me said “It’s MEANT to be heavy, that’s the whole point!” lol 🤦‍♀️

love this piece. I read On the Road for the first time and loved it (as a teenager). Read it second time (in late 20s with more developed feminist sensibilities) and HATED it. I think there are some things about it that are objectively good, but wow the characters & their behaviours are irksome

What does it take to make online parenting programmes work for families? Join us for an online lunchtime session to explore how online parenting interventions can help close the early years disadvantage gap

We have a brilliant, free online webinar coming up: What does it take to make online parenting programmes work for families?

Weds 9th July, 12-1pm

We’ll be joined by Eloise Stevens from the University of Cambridge and Eleni Bloy from the Race Equality Foundation

www.nesta.org.uk/event/what-d...

I washed my hands in the toilets at Fever Ray concert at Brixton Academy in 2010… next to Björk 😍

My 5 year old son used the word “yesternight” earlier. And I thought yes, that really ought to be a word. Sounds like it came straight out of a Romantic poem

UNICEF UK calls for more #HealthVisitors in hard-hitting report on child health inequalities which shows impact of deprivation on babies and young children across England. The Government must act now to break the links between deprivation and early outcomes
ihv.org.uk/news-and-vie...
#HealthVisiting

My daughter (9yo) had a friend for a sleepover last night. She just told me they were up past 11 playing poker 😂♠️♦️♣️♥️

Over half a million more children to get free school meals New entitlement to free school meals for all children in household on Universal Credit.

So great to see this policy - half a million more children entitled to free school meals. This will help a lot of families www.gov.uk/government/n...

Thank you @ncb.org.uk for bringing the sector together to call on the Prime Minister to demonstrate his commitment to the early years in this spending review