Check out Chatterbox Play Chain – Children’s Quarter worked through the Coronavirus Pandemic to deliver play packs, medicines and food to families of disabled children and young people and those with mental health, or other additional, needs.
Children’s Quarter is a one-member, one-vote cooperative of community groups, charities, schools and local organisations that: provide services to children, young people and their families; are committed to inclusion; and work collaboratively to achieve it.
We believe children and young people who are disabled or have mental health – or other additional – needs, and
their families, should be included by wider society and have access to the services they need and want. We set up in 2017 to improve and enable the way those services – public, private and voluntary – are coproduced.
We are based in Birmingham
But we know across England, as well as in this city, there is the demand and need for more:
- local
- affordable
- customised
- responsive
- high quality
- community-based
services for children and young people who are disabled or who have mental health, or other additional needs, because:
One-quarter of children and young people don’t ‘fit the box’…
That is, one in four children and young people is disabled or has mental health or other additional needs that mean they are vulnerable to social isolation and exclusion from local services. These include the opportunities most families take for granted, such as: play; education; sports and leisure opportunities; clubs, societies and opportunities to make friends. That is, an estimated 3 million children and young people in England who are being made vulnerable to social isolation. Figures from the Children’s Commissioner for England suggest:
- 1,500,000 children are disabled
- 1,400,000 children live in poverty
- 1,250,000 children have Special Educational Needs
- 1,100,000 children are in longterm workless families
- 800,000 children have mental health difficulties
- 170,000 children are young carers
- 150,000 children are excluded from school each year
- 120,000 children are homeless or in insecure housing
- 70,000 are ‘looked after’ children in local authority care
Clearly, many children and young people face more than one set of challenges, and…
Families are excluded too…
Because, across the country, there is virtually no specialist childcare; the large majority of mainstream childcare providers do not accommodate children facing the sort of challenges listed above; and, unlike mainstream schools, special schools do not run after-school clubs. Parents with disabled children or children with mental health and other additional needs are excluded from childcare; and excluded from work; and made dependent on benefits. That means families, including siblings, are more likely to suffer the effects of family breakdown and mental illness. Parents, particularly single parents and particularly mothers, of disabled children and children with mental ill-health and other additional needs are effectively, albeit we think unintentionally, singled out by government policies to be further excluded, financially and socially.
Find out about our CQ Campaign for Inclusive Childcare – we’re asking for local authorities and government to ring-fence resources for Specialist Childcare. Enabling parents/carers of SEND children to work is where some of the greatest economic gains are to be made by childcare policy.
Enough’s enough?
If you think so too, then please support Children’s Quarter. If you are a group that provides inclusive services to children, young people and families, then please join the cooperative. If your organisation isn’t a direct provider of services, but is concerned with the way children and families are being treated, then please sign up as an associate. If you’re an individual who believes we can’t go on wasting the talents and welfare of one quarter of the next generation just because they don’t ‘fit the box’, then please join as a supporter.
Enquire about membership – Children’s Quarter now has more than seventy members in Birmingham and the West Midlands region. We are a cooperative bringing together community groups, schools, charities and local organisations.
The Benefits of Belonging
Children’s Quarter members can take part in cooperative projects worth around half a million pounds a year, including in recent years:
Fit for All – our school holiday activity programme which is part-funded through Bring it on Brum. Every year we involve 5000 children and young people in inclusive play, drama, arts and craft, sports and youth activities – and provide tens of thousands of free and healthy meals during school holidays.
Fit for You – helping 500 autistic children and their families in Birmingham and Solihull to get involved in inclusive activities in their city and providing opportunities for families to support each other.
Gear Up For SEND – an online service for parents/carers and community providers of services for children and young people to learn together about the way statutory services work and coproduce (or do not coproduce) in relation to SEND young people.
Inclusion Fusion – including the Adventures in Inclusion collaboration based at Meriden Adventure Playground and through which cooperative members working together have formed and sustained a service enabling children with complex needs to get involved in adventurous play.
The Forge – a new service we’re developing with a group of member organisations to open up inclusive youth services based at The Factory Youth Centre in Longbridge.
CQ Members also have access to training at no cost and low cost, a network of specialist practitioners, shared opportunities for learning from practice and free events which create opportunities for campaigning, lobbying and improving practice.
More than five thousand children and young people in Birmingham and the West Midlands take part each year in activities coproduced with families and communities through Children’s Quarter.