Ms Suzanne Connolly:

The best example of that is two things Barnardos provides, one of which is support for young mums and young dads, as soon as the mum is pregnant, to ensure they can be the best parents they can be. A particular point is to ensure the mother stays in school or stays in education and continues to do well because we know that makes a big difference to outcomes for children, and that is research-based and evidence-based. The other thing we have in Barnardos is our early years family support service, which is providing that holistic approach to young children who really need it, and then we support their parents as well. We need to intervene early and we then need to ensure that children transition well to school and stay in school, or that they have alternative choices. They are the sort of things that are really important.

School is a very important context, or like-minded education supports for children who are not “good” academically but who might have a trade. It is that children are supported to have their needs met and have their developmental potential achieved. That is what I would like to see. Barnardos, alongside other organisations, is part of that trajectory for children. It comes back to the point I made that we need a mixture of the universal and the targeted, and that there is a range of professionals and volunteers who can meet that need.