Every Child's Future Matters - Sustainable Development Commission

Key judgement
“Agencies collaborate to safeguard
children according to the requirements
of current government guidance”
Collaboration between children’s services,
regeneration programmes and those charged with
community safety, can ensure that schemes such
as those providing community wardens have the
maximum amount of impact in ensuring children
can walk and cycle safely around their
neighbourhoods. Children and parents’ confidence
is key to children and young people’s ability to
‘enjoy and achieve’ and ‘make a positive
contribution’ locally. A national evaluation of nine
community warden schemes in Scotland found
them to have an impact out of all proportion to
their numbers. The schemes were found to exert a
positive influence on crime and anti-social behaviour
despite the fact that many of them operated in
areas where “informal types of social control that
many take for granted had broken down”. 97
DCSF’s revised guidance, Children’s Trusts:
Statutory guidance on inter-agency cooperation to
improve wellbeing of children, young people and
their families, (2008) advocates that Children’s Trust
partners champion child safety in the wider Local
Strategic Partnership, including wider issues such
as, preventing accidents, traffic calming measures,
access to quality green spaces and providing
sufficient opportunities for safe outdoor play and
safe places for teenagers to meet.
“Charge for parking at the school gates.”
Young person’s view of the London Plan
in respect of climate change. 99
“Many of the children and young people
we spoke to described the chaos caused
when parents, carers pick up and drop off
pupils… Groups spoke about how school
pick ups cause unnecessary pollution
as many cars only have one or two
pupils in them.”
National Children’s Bureau 98
Every Child’s Future Matters 29