Speaking up – Alison Morton gives powerful oral evidence to First 1000 Days Inquiry

6th June 2025

This week, on 4 June, Alison Morton, iHV CEO, gave oral evidence to the Health and Social Care Committee Inquiry on the First 1000 Days. Wednesday’s session was the second oral evidence session for the First 1000 Days Inquiry which accepted written evidence earlier this year (including a submission from the iHV) to examine progress made in this area since their last inquiry in 2019.

Health and Social Care Committee – First 1000 Days Inquiry

The session, titled “The First 1000 Days: a renewed focus”, examined local authority provision of early years services through the Family Hubs Model, with MPs posing questions about access to services, funding and workforce capacity. The cross-party Committee, chaired by Paulette Hamilton MP, were also particularly interested in the current state of health visiting and its impacts on babies, children and families.

During the two-hour session, Alison responded to numerous lines of questioning on the health visitor workforce, regional variation, commissioning arrangements, as well as opportunities to maximise the role of health visitors in the government’s three key shifts for the NHS and plans to improve uptake of immunisations.

Alison was joined on the panel by:

Christine Farquharson, Associate Director at the Institute for Fiscal Studies
Rukshana Kapasi, Director of Health at Barnardo’s
Rachel Roberts, Strategic Lead for Early Help and Prevention, Children, Young People and Family Services at Hull City Council.

The session considered the Family Hubs model in comparison with the Sure Start model, with Members questioning Christina Farquharson, the witness from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), on the recent IFS report on the impact of Sure Start centres and variations with Family Hubs. The cross-party Committee explored how effective Family Hubs had been at reaching families from different communities – and also included lines of questioning on the adequacy of current funding and where additional funding should be targeted, if it were available.

Influencing policies affecting health and advocating for others is a central tenet of health visiting. Whilst there were many examples shared by panellists on successes in Family Hubs, Alison provided a powerful voice for our profession – and for the babies, children and families who we support – highlighting the differences between the Family Hub model and the Healthy Child Programme, and the current gaps in healthcare provision for the first 1000 days.

Alison challenged the Committee to have high aspirations for children, stating:

“Every child deserves a robust healthcare system – postnatal care shouldn’t be left to chance… as much as we want to have a positive spin on this… there is a burning platform that we need to do better. And actually, what we’re seeing is huge variation across the country… and we need to think bigger and be ambitious for children.”

Responding to the evidence, Ben Coleman MP, gave a heartfelt response, stating:

“I’ve been listening to this discussion with rising fury. I think the situation we are in now, the collapse in health visitor numbers, the collapse in funding for… helping parents and children to start life is – I’ve got to say it – it’s an absolute disgrace! And we are letting our communities down, we are letting our families down, we are creating huge problems in our communities – and I want to say well done [to all health visitors] for what you are doing in an absolutely stinking situation! We have to put it right now.”

Alison said she hoped a commitment to improve health visiting would form part of the government’s highly anticipated 2025 spending review on departmental spending:

“What [health visitors] want is a government to stand up and say, ‘we back our health visitors, we support them, and we show you this by putting our words into action, and we’re going to invest in you’, so I’m hoping that might be the outcome of the spending review.”

Recognising the ‘burn out’ that many health visitors are facing, she also praised the tenacity of the workforce at an increasingly tough time for the profession.