“I really appreciate the grant received, as that has helped my partner and I hugely, particularly in this day of age of the rise in cost of living in Camden.”

What it is

The Family Hubs Pregnancy Grant is a means-tested, unconditional £500 cash grant offered proactively to low-income pregnant people in Camden. It’s designed to be simple, supportive and non-stigmatising.

Crucially, most eligible families do not need to apply. Instead, the council uses existing data to identify eligible parents and reaches out directly to let them know they can receive the grant – either cash from an ATM or as a direct bank transfer (see Part 3 for more information on the data flows that facilitate this).

This approach aims to reduce financial stress during pregnancy, increase trust in public services and create a warm entry point to Family Hub support.

Why it matters

Why give cash during pregnancy?

We know from academic research that financial support during pregnancy can help prevent adverse outcomes for babies, especially in low-income households. Maternal stress is strongly associated with low birth weight, preterm births and long-term developmental risks. Providing unconditional financial support can help reduce that stress and improve outcomes for the child.

This is backed by the Family Stress Model, which outlines how economic hardship affects child development through increased parental stress. Evidence from the UK's previous Health in Pregnancy Grant (2009-2011) showed that a relatively modest £190 payment led to measurable improvements in birth weight and reductions in preterm birth, especially for younger mothers and those in more deprived areas.

Why pair cash with services?

Recent research suggests we may see greater impact when financial support is stacked with other offers, such as parenting advice or community connection. We do not yet have a lot of evidence on this, but there are ongoing projects in Scotland, England, Sweden and Australia testing the impacts of bundled support. In our pilot, we sought to test a different bundle, taking a cash-first approach to help recipients free up mental bandwidth and build trust - making it more likely that parents take up other helpful services, such as Family Hubs or Healthy Start vouchers. In our theory of change (see the theory of change), we set out why we think the impact can be greater than the sum of its parts. Our evaluation, when complete, will generate more evidence on this.

Key considerations in Camden

Here we outline some of the practical steps we took and decisions we made in Camden.

Find out how many families we might support

We estimated that there would be 800 low-income families receiving benefits and having a baby within a one-year period. To estimate this, we used:

• ONS data, which suggests that there are around 2,000 babies born annually to Camden residents. This is different from the number of births registered in the borough - many babies are born in hospitals based in Camden but live elsewhere, and birth registration is based on place of birth.
• Camden’s State of the Borough report says that approximately 40% of children in Camden live in low-income households - 40% of 2,000 would be 800.
• As an additional check, we know from the Department for Work and Pensions’ data that approximately 3,300 children aged 0-4 live in households receiving Universal Credit, which would imply 650 children aged 0. But we know not all low-income households receive Universal Credit.

This rough estimate helped with early financial planning so we could very quickly get a ballpark figure for how much the grant would cost.

Decide how much money to offer

We offered £500, informed by:

• past grant values (for example, the Health in Pregnancy Grant was £190 in 2009, so approximately £300 in 2025 prices)
• £500 is the approximate value of Child Benefit for a first-born child (£26/week), if paid weekly from the date that the MatB1 form is issued (around week 20 of pregnancy)
• cost of living pressures in London
• available budget

Define eligibility

To be eligible, we decided people needed to be:

• living in Camden or in housing provided by Camden Council (including temporary accommodation or a refuge outside of the borough, and residents living in Camden while under the responsibility of other local authorities)
• under 20 weeks pregnant from 1 April 2025, and with their 20-week scan no later than 31 March 2026
• receiving or eligible for qualifying benefits (such as Universal Credit, Housing Benefit, or Council Tax Support).

These eligibility criteria work in the vast majority of cases, but we also had to consider and specify how we would approach ‘edge cases’, such as multiple births, miscarriages and households with no recourse to public funds.

We used receipt of benefits as a proxy for low-income that we could easily identify using data we already had. But we know that not everybody on a low income claims benefits. We also know that not all pregnant people living in Camden would be having their baby with a hospital in our local NHS trust and that anyone who fell into our ‘edge cases’ would not come up through the main data match. We have therefore set up an option for self-referral (see Part 3 for more details) for those who might be under-claiming benefits, or receiving care from a hospital in another area of London.

Plan when the grant will be delivered

Participants are informed of their eligibility through a letter and email after their 20-week ultrasound.

This timing was chosen for practical reasons, as the data we receive from the NHS is from the 20-week ultrasound scan. We also considered the following.

• Parent preference: from user testing, parents told us that they prefer to be contacted after the 20-week scan, because this is when the baby becomes ‘more real’ and parents are more willing to engage in preparing for the baby.
• Possible pregnancy loss or termination: the NHS estimates that one in eight known pregnancies end in miscarriage. Up to one in four conceptions are aborted. We wanted to avoid contacting families who had experienced a pregnancy loss, because we were concerned this would be upsetting. We were unable to establish a process to ensure that data collected earlier in the pregnancy would be reliably updated with information on pregnancy loss, and therefore we favoured using data from the 20-week scan. This also aligns with when pregnancy data would be shared with the health visiting team, which allowed us to tap into existing data sharing (see Part 3), but also meant we would not be holding information on pregnant people before this was shared with local health professionals.

Decide on a one-off grant or installments

Participants are given a one-off £500 grant. We also considered splitting this amount into a series of installments to be paid throughout the pregnancy. However, when we asked parents about this in our user testing, most said they would prefer a one-off payment. A one-off payment was also administratively simpler for the council and participants.

Informing parents about the grant and delivering it

Recipients first receive an email explaining the grant and letting them know they will soon get a text message with instructions for withdrawing the cash from an ATM. A few days later, they then receive a letter with NHS, Family Hubs and Camden Council branding to reinforce legitimacy and trust. Alongside this, all recipients are offered the option to complete a form, which serves two purposes: to update any incorrect or missing contact details (such as email address or mobile number) and to indicate whether they would prefer to receive their grant by bank transfer instead of cash (see the process map).

Recipients then follow one of three routes:

• If we have their mobile number and they do not complete the form:
  They automatically receive a text message within five days. This includes a secure code and instructions for withdrawing the money from an ATM.
• If they complete the form and request a bank transfer:
  The payment is made directly into their account within two weeks.
• If we are missing contact details (email or mobile):
  The recipient must complete the form first to provide their details and indicate their preferred payment method before the grant can be issued.

To support accessibility, all letters were translated into the seven most commonly spoken languages in the borough, with translations also available online.

The decision to pair an email with a letter was based on user testing. Because this grant is unexpected by most recipients, we wanted to ensure that communications felt official and trustworthy, and focus group participants told us they would trust a letter most, especially if it had the Family Hubs and NHS logos. We also know that many people’s contact details are out of date, hence the importance of contacting people through multiple channels.

Getting the word out

Beyond direct communications with parents, we also focused on briefing other professionals that families were likely to get in touch with to enquire about or validate the offer. This briefing helped to ensure professionals who work with parents knew about the programme, as well as helping recipients to verify the grant’s legitimacy through a council website or a trusted professional. We ran short briefings and provided a one-page practical information sheet, and an FAQ sheet for:

• midwives
• Family Hubs staff
• councillors
• other frontline staff undertaking outreach work with families (such as the Children and Young People health improvement team)
• local schools
• voluntary and community sector organisations we routinely work with.

We also set up a dedicated webpage, email address and phone line so people could research the grant and reach out to us independently.