We’ll make sure no child is left behind

TTHERE was a launch of a campaign on November 29, to ensure no child is left behind in Cheltenham and declaring 2019 a Year of Action to try and make sure that the slogan is true.

The trigger for this is the Cheltenham Children’s Needs Assessment for 2018. People sometimes assume child poverty isn’t a problem in places like Cheltenham, but the figures show that in some areas of the town up 43 per cent of children are being brought up in poverty and that this is true of about 4300 children and young people overall.

This isn’t just an issue in Cheltenham. Sadly child poverty is on the rise across the country.

While we and others are lobbying government nationally to tackle this, we aren’t prepared to wait around for that to happen.

The aim of the ‘Year of Action’ is both to raise the profile of the issue and make sure everyone is working together to tackle the problems involved.

It worked well for the recent Heads up Cheltenham campaign to tackle mental health issues and is being used again here.

This definitely isn’t something the borough council can fix by itself. We will be working with partnership organisations.

The themes will focus on healthy relationships, confidence, physical and mental health, budgeting and future careers.

It all starts in January 2019 with child poverty summit to bring together all those interested in helping tackle this issue.

There’s plenty of time for new ideas and events to be added during the year so everyone can get involved.

I hope that when we look back we can say that the Year of Action has been a success and we can genuinely say that in Cheltenham no child has been left behind. But I suspect to achieve that we will also need government at a national level to take the issue equally seriously.