As far as possible, what children really need is to be brought up by two parents. Since there is such a clear link between family stability and children’s outcomes, where are the policies to promote family stability and deal with the problem of rising family breakdown? Firstly, I estimate that over half a million additional families have separated since 1980 entirely due to the trend away from marriage, encouraged by successive governments that have minimized and abolished differences in treatment of married and unmarried families. Three quarters of family breakdown involving young children now comes from the collapse of unmarried families. Secondly, modern relationship education programmes for couples and parents are increasingly accessible, backed by good research, and highly effective at improving relationship stability. Yet while the average taxpayer spends at least £570 per year picking up the pieces of family breakdown, just 21p is spent on preventing things from getting worse. A genuine mini-manifesto for children would focus on incentivising marriage and promoting widespread access to relationship education. Politicians have been quick to act now that the school dinner scandal has come to light. What will it take to do the same for the far more serious scandal of family breakdown? Labour’s policy is a mini-manifesto for adults.

Yours faithfully

Harry Benson

Bristol Community Family Trust

25 Somerset St

Kingsdown

Bristol BS2 8LZ

Harry Benson's website is here.