Chloe Smith: Every child in Norwich, whatever their background, deserves the knowledge, skills, confidence and networks to succeed.

Chloe Smith, MP for Norwich North, this week met with the Government’s Social Mobility Director, Kathryn Laing, and Policy Expert, Jodie Smith, to discuss the recent Social Mobility Index, published by the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, which indicated that the poorest children growing up in the Norwich City Council area have some of the worst life chances in England. 

 

Chloe has taken up the battle in Parliament, calling a debate on the report, putting questions to Ministers, and meeting experts such as Laing and Smith.  

 

In Norwich, Chloe is preparing to host a roundtable of local and regional MPs, Council Leaders, Head Teachers, the Bishop of Norwich, the Vice Chancellor of UEA, the Job Centre and the Local Enterprise Partnership.  The aim is to develop a strategy to tackle Norwich’s social mobility shortfall.

 

The report compares the chances for children from poorer backgrounds in doing well at school, finding a good job and having a decent standard of living once they are an adult. In simple terms, Norwich’s poorest kids are not getting the same chances as their peers elsewhere in England.

 

In her meeting, Chloe also discussed how childcare can be used to address the worrying gaps in child attainment.

 

The Government is committed to 30 hours free childcare a week for working parents of infants. Significant increases in childcare support available for working parents will make it easier to combine work with raising a family. Locally Chloe is leading a campaign to bring together providers, charities and the local authority to increase childcare provision here in Norwich.

 

Commenting on the meeting Chloe said:

 

“In plain English, social mobility means nothing should stand in your way if you want to change your life.  It means no one has to do what their parents did; everyone should have access to the opportunities to break out if they want to.  I used this meeting to discuss good examples of what is being done around the country and what more we can do.”

 

Chloe goes on:

 

“This report was about the boundaries of Norwich City Council so I hope they take it as seriously as I do. We all need to work together to improve our children’s prospects here in Norwich. This means working across party, across government and across the public, private and charity sectors.

 

“We need to build on the achievements we’ve already made, such as the Norwich for Jobs project which I founded in the last parliament. We also need to bring more jobs to Norwich via better transport links, and my campaign for Norwich in 90 puts this as a central objective. 

 

“There is also a lot of good work already being done by our business community to work with local schools to broaden pupil’s knowledge what opportunities are out there. I’m calling on businesses in Norwich to step up even further, and work with every school to provide a network and an opportunity for inspiration, focused on those who need it the most. 

 

“I want every child in Norwich, whatever their background, to have the knowledge, skills, confidence and networks to succeed.”