The Green Paper from the Centre for Social Justice, an independent think-tank set up by Mr Duncan Smith, was published last week ahead of the Government's Green Paper on families.
It claims that early years training fails to take into account the importance of a child's neurological development and does not fully equip professionals to identify children experiencing parenting deficits.
The report, which is critical of Government policies on marriage and the family and points to evidence from the OECD of a negative impact single-parent households can have on children, suggests that councils employ a director of family services to sit above the directors of children's and adults' services. It proposes dividing the DCSF into the Department for Families and the Department for Education.
Mr Duncan Smith also calls for the implementation of a transferrable tax allowance for married couples with children aged up to age three, to be extended to all married couples once the current economic situation improves.
Other measures outlined in the paper include incorporating Sure Start children's centres into Family Hubs, acting as joined up family services for the community that focus on early years and outreach.
It says the criteria for families' access to the Family Nurse Partnership, which currently works with young first-time mothers, should be extended to include a 'broader' range of families.
Further information: 'Green Paper on the Family' can be seen at www.centreforsocialjustice.org.uk