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Sure Start Children's Centres

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to make that point. Secondly, the Committee urged the Government to give the programme time to bear fruit, given that even the oldest tranche of centres was only about 6 years old at that stage. The Committee said:"““It would be catastrophic if Children's Centres were not afforded long-term policy stability and security of funding while evaluation is ongoing.””" Thirdly, the Committee categorically urged against the removal of ring-fencing, saying:"““We consider that it would be unwise to remove the ring-fence around Children's Centres funding in the short or medium term; putting Centres at the mercy of local vicissitudes would risk radically different models and levels of service developing across the country, with differences out of proportion to the variation in community needs.””" Some Tory Members served on that Committee, so this was a cross-party report.