OUR life chances are shaped long before school even begins. That’s why Labour governments focus on the early years, from pregnancy onwards, because tackling inequality right at the start and focusing on prevention is lifechanging.

This government’s new Best Start in Life strategy aims to close the early years opportunity gap by supporting families from pregnancy through to the start of school. It builds on the legacy of Sure Start, one of the last Labour government’s most successful policies.

Family Hubs are restoring what worked. These locally based, one‑stop shops back the principles that made Sure Start so effective: integrated health and family support, delivered close to home. For a family expecting a baby, this means access to midwifery, health visiting, infant feeding support and perinatal mental health services, without having to wait for multiple referrals.

Each Hub will provide preventative and universal health services for everyone, with a particular focus on babies. Parents will benefit from practical, supportive advice alongside activities such as ‘stay and play’ sessions, which can be a way to get support and advice while meeting people in the same situation. Hubs will also support children’s learning and development at home, provide early help for those with additional needs through a Best Start Inclusion Practitioner, and offer practical assistance such as debt and welfare advice.

For Truro and Falmouth, The Lighthouse is our Family Hub. In time, it will work alongside the new Women’s and Children’s Unit at Treliske, strengthening local maternity and family care and ensuring support is joined‑up.

Together with Healthy Babies, Family Hubs represent the largest expansion of joined‑up health, education and family support since Sure Start. Two-hundred new Hubs have opened recently, bringing the total to over 800. This delivers on the government’s pledge to ensure every area has a Hub by the end of April, with up to 1,000 in place by 2028. Backed by funding from both the Department for Education and the Department of Health and Social Care, this supports the government’s Neighbourhood Health ambition, shifting from sickness to prevention, and from hospitals into communities.

Ahead of the strategy’s launch, I welcomed the Early Years Minister, MP Olivia Bailey, to a nursery in Truro. Early support and intervention can transform lives, particularly for families of children with SEND, where faster access to support can make such a difference.

Best Start sits within a wider programme for our littlies. This includes 30 hours of government funded childcare, new state nurseries (I’m pushing for more of these in Truro and Falmouth – we don’t have enough), free breakfast clubs, including at Tregony Community Primary School, St Francis CofE Primary School and Falmouth Primary Academy, a commitment to a library in every school and a school nurse, and new screen‑time guidance offering practical advice for under 5s. As well as reforms to parental leave and the removal of the two‑child limit which will instantly lift nearly half a million children out of poverty.