The Scots' Crisis of Child Development

Speakers: Alan Sinclair and Carol Craig

Scotland is facing a crisis in child development, and this is of vital importance to anyone who cares about Scotland's future. Scotland cannot be a vibrant, productive, well-functioning society unless we can improve the experience of children as what happens in childhood has enormous repercussions for future health and well-being.

Alan Sinclair has worked closely with the Centre for Confidence and Well-being for the past fifteen years and has written one of the Postcards from Scotland books - Right from the Start: Investing in parents and babies. His interest in early years policies developed when he was Head of Skills for Scottish Enterprise and interested in the development of the type of skills employers were looking for. He quickly learned that these were developed in the early years and that investing in this age group gave much higher returns for society than university education.

Alan has been worried for years about the poor start in life that blights many Scots children. But he has become acutely concerned since the Scottish Government published new data from Health Visitors a few months ago. For the very first time EVERY child in Scotland between the age of 27 and 30 months has been assessed by Health Visitors on five key life skill development stages and the new data reveals startling results.

Alan is so shocked by the data that he likens their publication to a large bomb exploding. In other words, the poor development of so many Scottish children has devastating consequences for the children and society. This is because child development is sequential and cumulative. Scientific research shows conclusively that the first 1,000 days of a child's life from preconception to two years of age is the most vital stage of physical, emotional and brain development. So, what happens early in a child's life is a significant building block and predictor of what's likely to happen to that child in the future. In other words, developmental dysfunction has important implications for the child’s health, behaviour, learning and future employment.

Alan will present this data at the event but it's important to point out here that the problem is not confined to poor babies and young children in Scotland. There's also a substantial group of more affluent children with significant developmental dysfunction. Child poverty is important, but it's too blunt a categorisation as the issue is much more complex.

Alan argues that authorities are unreasonably expecting teachers to deal with so many children with these developmental delays and that the figures may help us understand why a recent Audit Scotland Briefing reports that 40 per cent of children in Scottish schools are now judged to require 'additional support for learning'.

Alan Sinclair is fearful of what the Health Visitors data show but also thinks it can be a source of hope as it provides firm evidence of the problem we need to address and the straightforward remedies.

Carol Craig published The Scots' Crisis of Confidence in 2003 and set up the Centre in 2004. But, as she explains in her new book A Time of Hope: The story of the Centre for Confidence and Well-being, she now thinks that confidence is the least of Scotland's problems. She also believes that the way that Scotland has historically treated its children is the key to understanding many of Scotland's health and social problems including the damaging effects of drugs and alcohol. In the book Carol reports on an Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) prevalence study for Scotland which has attracted zero attention yet reveals that Scots experience many more ACEs than people in England and Wales. She has also been heavily influenced by the argument that Alan Sinclair sets out in Right from the Start.

Carol will chair the event and present a few of her own thoughts following Alan Sinclair's presentation. There will be plenty time for questions and discussion.

We hope that you will join us on the 20th of May for an interesting and important presentation and subsequent discussion.