For out-of-school provision these recommendations have the potential to be a major catalyst to bring together the myriad of services for children into one framework that is universal but through which targeted services can be delivered. Government has invested significant amounts in out-of-school provision, but these interventions are all being delivered by different people, and are all counting different outcomes. The challenge is to join them up, to put aside the departmental boxes and to begin to develop planned, co-ordinated and integrated services. In the confusion that exists, it is often the most vulnerable children that get lost.
For out-of-school schemes, joined-up services mean broader partnerships with schools, with leisure departments and with social services and youth justice teams. It will mean operating within a local plan that co-ordinates services and ensures that targeted services for the most vulnerable children are available - through, and developed from, out-of-school schemes. The reality is that most out-of-school schemes would be able to offer support for vulnerable children if they had the support of the local authority.
Joining things up is much easier to talk about in theory than do in practice. More than anything it means change. The big change has to be the recognition at the highest levels of the importance of safe, positive play and learning opportunities for children out of school as a key preventative service - for all children, but especially the most vulnerable, and the determination to deliver this in a co-ordinated way.