Labor pledges to end ‘scandal of falling health outcomes for children’ – British Politics Live

Good morning. Keir Starmer will today begin a series of fortnightly visits to Britain designed to promote Labour’s “missions”, and today he is in the north-west of England to launch the party’s child health action plan. He has written about the proposals for the Guardian here.

If Pippa Crerar In her report, Starmer explains that Starmer is not concerned by claims that measures such as supervised teeth brushing for three to five year olds in nursery are a ‘nanny state’. Starmer says:

I know we need to address this issue of the nanny state. As soon as you do something about children’s health, people say, “You’re going the route of the nanny state.” We want to fight that battle.

Wes Straating, the shadow health secretary, spoke about the plans on the Today program this morning and said he was shocked by the evidence showing the extent to which the health and wellbeing of the country’s children has declined. He said children under the Tories were becoming smaller than their international peers.

At the heart of all the policies we are announcing today is a focus on prevention, promoting good health among children, and ensuring we halt this decline in our country.

If you look at the OECD tables, and you look at children’s height, which is an indicator of their health, their diet and their physical activity, we are sliding backwards in the international rankings for boys and girls. We literally don’t stand as high as we do on the world stage. And I think this is shameful.

And in its press release, Labor says:

British children today are smaller than Haitian children, fatter than French children and less happy than Turkish children.

The height of the average British five-year-old girl has fallen 27 places in the international rankings over the past thirty years, while the average British five-year-old boy has fallen 33 places in the height rankings.

Here’s a graph of it an ITV report that illustrates the point.

Labor says it wants to “end the scandal of plummeting health outcomes for children” and “produce the healthiest and happiest generation of children ever to emerge in Britain”.

Here is the agenda for the day.

9:30 am: NHS England publishes its monthly performance figures.

Morning: Keir Starmer and Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, are visiting the north-west of England to promote Labour’s health missions. They both do media interviews.

10:00 am: Post Office Horizon’s IT investigation will resume for the first time since the ITV drama sparked public outrage over the scandal. Stephen Bradshaw, a former Post Office investigator, gives evidence.

After 10:30 am: Penny Mordaunt, the Leader of the House of Commons, will make a statement in the House on next week’s business.

11.30 am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.

Afternoon: Humza Yousaf, First Minister of Scotland, answers questions in Holyrood.

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