I don’t suppose I need to repeat the refrain about this government’s authoritarianism. In its eleven years in power, Labour’s base instinct has been to legislate its way out of every problem, every bad headline and every moral panic.
We’ve seen a criminal justice policy dictated more by Paul Dacre than common sense and we’ve seen public health campaigns that achieve Cromwellian standards of piety. Such is the level of disgust with the overbearing Big Brother State, we’re frequently seeing liberals, libertarians and some left-wingers converge onto a common ground they rarely share.
And then this week the government went and threw a fork in the road.
Whilst it was under-reported by a media on the trail of new by-election blood, the Department for Children, Schools and Families announced its initial findings about the piloted Family Nurse Partnership programme. The details of this scheme are enough to make a civil libertarian blush with disgust: state-sponsored snoopers invading the homes of new parents and teaching them how to look after their own kids. If anything symbolises the nanny state Britain’s become then it’s this, right?
Well, yes. Except, it might just be working. The Family Nurse partnership is inspired by similar programmes in the United States which have found that a child’s development happens from a very early age, and if a kid’s going to receive a decent chance in life, they need good parenting from day one. In deprived communities without much education or skills and blighted by crime, drugs and family breakdown, a child’s life chances are severely hampered, and this tends to create a self-perpetuating cycle. The idea of the family nurse partnership is to break this cycle by giving new mothers and fathers all the advice and opportunities they need to give their own children the care they might not have received themselves.
Some of the successes & short-term benefits of the scheme can be found in here, but it’s the long-term benefits that might be most promising. Could such a scheme make a positive effect on family breakdown, antisocial behaviour and even crime and a child’s education? It certainly wouldn’t hurt, and as this article points out, trials in the US have shown
the scheme led to improved prenatal health of mother and baby, fewer childhood injuries, fewer subsequent pregnancies and longer breaks between births, increased maternal employment and greater readiness for school.
The point I want to make here is that good policy can fall anywhere between the two poles of libertarian and authoritarian and only an ideologue would favour or oppose policies according to where they fall on the political compass. Instead, we should ask whether a policy achieves what its creators intended, whether it helps those who need it, whether it does so without infringing civil liberties and whether it justifies the financial cost. Our ultimate aim should be good government, and whilst Labour’s nanny state tendency frequently seems like the exact opposite, on this issue, at least, they might just be getting it right.
Instead, we should ask whether a policy achieves what its creators intended, whether it helps those who need it, whether it does so without infringing civil liberties and whether it justifies the financial cost.
Completely agree.
Though the obvious problem with (say) targetting 3 year olds in a certain way is that we won’t be able to answer questions 1,2 and 4 for 20 years…
Yes, I completely agree too. At the very least, even if you think there are important principles at stake, rights that are violated, or that there are hard-to-see and indirect consequences from state intervention, you need to weigh these up against the direct results of the intervention - and as you say, whether you are libertarians and statists
One question: What happens if a family does not wish to co-operate with the ‘Family Nurse Partnership’ scheme?
When I see the term “nanny state”, I reach for my revolver - then find that I don’t have one because you’re not even allowed to carry fake guns anymore. Which is great. Complaints about the nanny state are, more often than not, simply ways of avoiding a serious debate about the merits and costs of a given policy - if a policy is a bad one it is not because it is nannylike but because it will be harmful or wasteful.
Right, I’m meant to be going to glamorous Leeds in about 10 minutes, so I’ll try to be brief for once:
cjcjc:
“Though the obvious problem with (say) targetting 3 year olds in a certain way is that we won’t be able to answer questions 1,2 and 4 for 20 years…”
Absolutely. When it comes to children’s development, we won’t know whether a government got it right for many, many years, but I guess we do have indicators of progress along the way - school testing & whatnot. Having said that, I loathe the over-testing in our schools, so I should probably think of a way around that contradiction.
QuestionThat:
“One question: What happens if a family does not wish to co-operate with the ‘Family Nurse Partnership’ scheme?”
There have only been 10 pilot schemes thus far, with plans for 20 more. Up until now, it’s worked on the basis of voluntary enrolment. - The enrolment rates have been pretty impressive, actually: in the areas targeted, 88% of those under 20 enroled in the scheme
Woobegone:
“Complaints about the nanny state are, more often than not, simply ways of avoiding a serious debate about the merits and costs of a given policy - if a policy is a bad one it is not because it is nannylike but because it will be harmful or wasteful”
Exactly.
Aye, in response to cjcjc we aren’t going to have quick fixes for problems when it comes to childhood and development. The sooner everyone realised this the better. If we need to make societal change we need to be in it for the long haul and reactive to issues that arise.
It seems to this layman that the US - or rather certain US states - has a lot of experience to offer in this regard.
Whether Wisconsin welfare reform, or the family nurse partnership, there are a lot of innovatory ideas whose results should be looked at more closely.
A more useful exercise than always (and only) moaning, like P Toynbee, about how the US is dreadful and why can’t we jusr turn ourselves into Sweden.
(Without Swedish health or education vouchers of course…)
- direct link -
cjcjc