## **Foundation Years Information and Research** 


## **Annual report and unaudited financial statements** 

**6th April 2020– 5[th] April 2021** 

**Charity no. 1158170** 



## **Reference and administration details** 

**Charity registration number** 1158170 **Charity name** Foundation Years Information and Research **Registered address** 35 Ulleswater Road London N14 7BL **Telephone number** 020 8372 1516 **Email address** office@fyir.org.uk **Website** www.fyir.org.uk **President** Lord Field of Birkenhead  CH **Co-Chairs** Karen Buck MP, Catherine West MP **Trustees** Karen Buck MP  (appointed 2016) Robin Balbernie (appointed 2020) Dr Sunil Singh Bhopal (appointed 2020) Marcus Codrington-Fernandez (appointed 2016) Professor Gabriella Conti (appointed 2016) Professor Dame Sarah Cowley (appointed 2014) Merle Davies (appointed 2021) Professor Pasco Fearon (appointed 2016) Lord Field of Birkenhead CH (appointed 2014) Dr Rob Hale (Vice Chair) (appointed 2014) Professor Jane Hurry (appointed 2018) Dr Amanda Jones (Vice Chair) (appointed 2014) Dr Carine Minne (appointed 2014) Ron Orders (appointed 2014) Jane O’Rourke (appointed 2017) Nick Peacey (Secretary) (appointed 2014) Andrew Pitt (Treasurer) (appointed 2014) Dr Matthias von der Tann (appointed 2014) Catherine West MP (appointed 2018) 

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**Bank** National Westminster Bank Muswell Hill Branch, 190 Muswell Hill Broadway, London N10 3TF 

The trustees present their reports and financial statements for the period 6th April 2020-5[th] April 2021. 

## **Structure, governance and management** 

Foundation Years Information and Research is a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) and was established with approval of the Charity Commission on 7[th] August 2014. The CIO is governed by a constitution. 

The first trustee appointments were made in August 2014 for a three-year term. Trustees may serve up to three consecutive terms before a break is enforced. The Trustees meet three times annually and hold an Annual General Meeting. 

New trustees are briefed on relevant trust matters by the Secretary. 

## **Officers** 

Karen Buck, MP, and Catherine West MP are Co-Chairs. 

The first Chair of FYIR was Lord Field of Birkenhead. Lord Field resigned as Chair in September 2015 and has now become president of FYIR. 

## **Trustees** 

We were delighted to welcome Dr Sunil Bhopal as a Trustee. 

## **Objectives and activities** 

The objects of the CIO are: 

- To advance public education and understanding of the substantial body of scientific work on the extent to which the earliest relationships play a major role in shaping a baby’s brain and in influencing their future mental and physical health 

- To promote research and study into all aspects of the foregoing, including improved knowledge of neuroscience and developmental processes and to make available the useful results 

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## **Report** 

## **Working through the pandemic** 

In common with many organisations during the financial year 2020 to 2021, FYIR’s face-to-face meetings and events were curtailed by lockdowns and the pandemic. 

However, we found our way forward through increasing understanding of the possibilities of Zoom and other communication strategies and were able to have a series of successful meetings online.  We have enjoyed including distinguished foreign and farflung UK participants so easily (and cheaply!) in our discussions. For this reason, it seems unlikely that Trustees will wish to return to a programme solely consisting of face-to-face meetings in the future. 

With the support of our web specialist, Cate Rae, who generously gives us time, she says, as a relaxation from being Managing Director of her technology company, we were able to take full advantage of our Youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSAP17lTNQc8RcAGrguDH1A to broadcast all speakers’ presentations soon after the meetings when they were given. 

## **Seminars and Meetings by Zoom** 

Trustees met on Zoom three times during the summer months of 2020 in order to review developments in policy and service provision for the 0-2 age group during the pandemic and to raise awareness of concerns. Discussions frequently centred round: 

1. service redeployment, which was particularly high in some areas during the first lockdown, and had profound effects on services such as health visiting where recruitment and retention was already an issue; 

2.  professionals’ anxieties about effective safeguarding checks when the only communication possible with families was online; 

3. the long-term effects of gaps in provision created by responses to COVID19 on such conditions as oncology specialisms and children and parents’ mental health. In relation to this point, our trustee Professor Gabriella Conti published a briefing on parental involvement and play during lockdown at the end of July 2020. This was based on data from a web survey during May of 18,000 people, members of five nationally representative cohort studies and resulted in headlines in _the Guardian (30/7/20)_ : “Women 'put careers on hold' to home school during UK Covid-19 lockdown”; “women across several age groups bore the brunt of childcare and home schooling” Our Chair, Catherine West MP, pursued all these concerns with Ministers and other colleagues in Parliament. 

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**16[th] November 2020** FYIR was delighted to welcome the Rt Hon Andrea Leadsom MP and Professor Susan Golombok, Director of the Centre for Family Research at the University of Cambridge. Andrea gave us a thorough and upbeat pre-publication account of progress on the Government’s crossdepartmental Early Healthy Development Review, which she led. 

Susan introduced her book _We are Family: What Really Matters for Parents and Children_ which explains how her research challenges commonly held assumptions about new family forms and also contests widely held theories of child development by demonstrating that structural aspects of the family are less important for children’s psychological wellbeing than the quality of family relationships. 

## **7th December 2020** 

At this seminar we learned of developments in France, Norway and the UK. 

Nathalie Casso-Vicarini founded and now leads the charity 'Ensemble pour l'Education de la Petite Enfance' (Eduensemble). Nathalie was a leading light of the French National Commission on the first 1000 days of life, and gave us good news on the reception and implementation of the Commission’s Report **https://solidarites-sante.gouv.fr/IMG/pdf/rapport-1000-premiersjours.pdf** 

Tove Mogstad-Slinde, the Norwegian Government's Senior Adviser on Early Childhood Education and Care, took us through the progressive and effective Norwegian framework of provision for the first days of life. As always, the promotion of equity of through Scandinavian systems for under 5s services impressed her audience. 

Our trustee Gabriella Conti of UCL reviewed the significant and widely reported Royal Foundation' review of attitudes to early childhood. She was impressed by the review’s emphasis on, and analysis of, evidence gathered from many parents and carers (a sadly neglected resource), while feeling that we should not underplay the importance of quality support that builds on the best possible start for life advocated in the review. 

## **Collaboration with Ensemble pour l'Education de la Petite Enfance** 

Online collaboration with the French charity Eduensemble was an important feature of the year.  The face-to-face Congress that EduEnsemble and the OECD planned in Paris was turned into a virtual ‘international train journey’ with stops (conferencing dates) running between 30[th] June and 20[th] November 2020. This excellent series of online events used an innovative and (usually) efficient virtual environment incorporating avatars, a lecture hall and a railway station on which one platform hosted a train with carriages full of panels of film, still images and information on early years. FYIR contributed to the opening ceremony: Dr Rob Hale was invited to 

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submit a podcast and recorded a fascinating discussion with Drs Amanda Jones and Sebastian Kraemer for the session. 

We welcomed the publication of the report of the French Presidential Commission _Les 1000 Premiers Jours_ in September. Eduensemble had a leading role in the Commission, to which FYIR Trustees, Rob Hale, Nick Peacey, Gabriella Conti and Pasco Fearon gave evidence in 2019.  Reference to the UK Parliament’s Health and Social Care Select Committee 2019 report, _First Thousand Days of Life,_ appeared strongly in the Commission’s publication. The Secretary sent the Commission a copy of that report; it was circulated to all members of the Commission in their preparatory reading. 

Impact statement 

We were pleased that the report of the French Presidential Commission Les 1000 Premiers Jours showed clearly that our input had affected their conclusions. 

The charity trustees, throughout the year, raised awareness of issues based on members’ concerns concerning 0-3 year olds in a time of COVID with policy makers and others, not least through Parliamentary Questions. 

For example: 

Supply of health visitors during the pandemic 

https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answersstatements/written-question/Commons/2020-06-23/63448/ 

Child development : Healthy Child Programme appointments https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answersstatements/written-question/Commons/2020-06-23/63449/ 

Routine vaccinations/immunisation https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answersstatements/written-question/Commons/2020-06-29/66150/ 

Increased risk during lockdown, increased need for safeguarding https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2020-0902/84314 

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## **Financial review** 

There are no funds materially in deficit. The principal sources of funding in the period to 5[th] April 2021 were: 

• Funds carried forward from the previous year’s operations: £2069 FYIR’s expenditure has supported the key objectives of the charity through the continuation of the organisation’s seminar programme, meetings and collaborations with development of the website to include a Youtube channel to broaden the scope of information and evidence we make available relevant to the organisation’s aims. 

## **Reserves Policy** 

The aim of the trustees is to hold at least 6 months overhead expenses in reserve. The fund at 5[th] April 2021 meets this test. 

Approved by the Trustees and signed on their behalf 

Catherine West MP Chair 

## **Financial review** 

There are no funds materially in deficit. 

The principal sources of funding in the period to 5[th] April 2021 were: 

- Funds carried forward from the previous year’s operations: £2069 

FYIR’s expenditure has supported the key objectives of the charity through the continuation of the organisation’s seminar programme, a fact finding visit to German under 2s provision and maintenance of the website to share information on research evidence relevant to the organisation’s aims. 

## **Reserves Policy** 

The aim of the trustees is to hold at least 6 months overhead expenses in reserve. The fund at 5[th] April 2021meets this test. 

Approved by the Trustees and signed on their behalf 


Catherine West MP Chair 

Date 10.1.22 

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## **Statement of financial activities incorporating income and expenditure account for period 6th April 2020 to 5[th] April 2021** 

||**Restricted**<br>**Funds**<br>**£**|**Unrestricted**<br>**Funds**<br>**£**|**2020/2021**<br>**Total**<br>**£**|
|---|---|---|---|
|**Incoming resources**||||
|Incomingresources -grants|0|0|0|
|Donations|0|300|300|
|**Total incoming resources**|**0**|**300**|300|
|||||
|**Resources expended -**<br>**charitable**||||
|Administration/staff<br>development|0||0|
|Design|0||0|
|Phone|0||0|
|**Refreshments/sustenance**|**0**||0|
|**Speakers**<br>**honoraria/hospitality**|**0**||0|
|**VAT**|**0**||0|
|**Accommodation**|||0|
|**Total expenditure**|**0**||**0**|
|||||
|**Surplus/deficit for the**<br>**period**|**0**|**300**|**300**|
|**Brought forward from**<br>**previous financial**<br>**year**||**2069**|**2069**|
|**Carried forward**|**0**|**2369**|**2369**|



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## **Balance sheet** 

|**As at 5th April 2021**|**Restricted**<br>**funds**|**Unrestricted**<br>**funds**<br>**£**|
|---|---|---|
|Fixed assets|0|0|
|Current assets:<br>Debtors<br>Cash|0<br>0|0<br>2369|
|Creditors due within 1year|0|0|
|**Net assets**||2369|
|Funds:<br>Restricted funds<br>Unrestricted funds|0|0<br>2369|
||0|2369|



Approved by the Trustees and signed on their behalf 


Catherine West MP, Chair 

Date: 10.1.22 

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## **1. Accounting Policies** 

## **a) Basis of preparation** 

The financial statements have been prepared under the historical cost convention and in accordance with applicable accounting standards. They follow the recommendations in the statement of recommended practice Accounting and Reporting by Charities (issued in March 2005). 

## **b) Income** 

Grants are credited to income when receivable. 

## **c) Expenses** 

Expenses are recognised in the period when they are incurred. 

## **d) Restricted funds** 

These are grants received for specific purposes. Expenses incurred for these purposes are charged to the restricted fund. 

## **2. Staff costs** 

The charity has no employees. 

## **3. Taxation** 

The charity is exempt from corporation tax as all its income is charitable income applied for charitable purposes. 

## **4. Trustees remuneration/expenses** 

Trustees receive no remuneration. 

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