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In A fairer start

Start Strong: changing the story on early childhood

This project started in September 2025 and will end in May 2027

Working together to place early childhood development at the heart of our society and economy.

Start Strong was established by a coalition of philanthropic foundations including Nesta, Collective Futures, Impact on Urban Health, Ethos Foundation, the Tessa Jowell Foundation and Minderoo. The founding partners came together with a vision to bring together a wide range of voices across and beyond the early childhood community, and to build a powerful coalition that cuts through, shifts public attitudes, and places early childhood development at the heart of our society and economy.

The UK has some of the highest rates of childhood inequality in Europe, with a negative impact on children's development, life chances, and wider society.

Start Strong's vision is for every baby and young child in the UK to have a good early childhood. This means ending entrenched inequalities in early experiences and outcomes, giving all our children a fair start.

Through an evidence-based approach to advocacy and communications, we will unite the early childhood community into a powerful coalition that cuts through, shifts public attitudes, and supports governments to take bold action to ensure every child has a fair start in life.

Find out more on the Start Strong website.

Impact goal

Through an evidence-based approach to advocacy and communications, we will unite the early childhood community into a powerful coalition that cuts through, shifts public attitudes, and places early childhood development at the heart of our society and economy.

Our aim is to create a new and transformational story about the pivotal importance of early childhood. This story will drive multiple policy, industry and civil societal goals and be underpinned by shared societal values.

What are we doing?

We are currently in the foundational stage of this project.

So far, we have scoped what a collective advocacy effort, specifically focused on tackling systemic drivers of early childhood inequality, would entail. During this scoping stage, we consulted with over 50 stakeholders and carried out comprehensive research on the current landscape of early childhood advocacy in the UK.

We also looked beyond the UK to learn from global campaigns that have changed societal narratives around complex issues. We put in place the governance and operations for the coalition, and agreed upon a 10-year goal:

Transform UK understanding and prioritisation of early childhood with the public, government, politicians, media and business as an investment that benefits us all, and that all individuals and institutions have a role in enabling.
Transform understanding and action (public and institutional) that recognises that primary caregivers and the home environment are the critical contexts that determine early childhood development and outcomes, and that the home environment does not exist in a bubble, but within the systems and structures that influence it.