Start as you mean to go on

Nearly half of all 5 year olds in the UK are not reaching a good level of development was the story that the news media picked up from the Marmot review team's latest publication, issued on the anniversary of the original Marmot Review. This figure is based on assessment of children during their first year of school (the Early Years Foundation Stage Profile) and attention on this and other social determinants like young people not in education, employment or training (NEET) plays to the big theme in the Marmot Review, that inequalities are established in childhood. What the headlines omitted was that the EYFSP trend is rising, from 49% of children reaching "a good level of development" in 2008, when the assessment was first introduced, to the present 56%, and the fact remains that the area with the highest EYFSP score, the London Borough of Richmond, only reaches 69%.