This week, Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson, announced that schools are now able to apply to become one of the first to offer a new, government-backed free breakfast club after the government announced the tripling of investment in breakfast clubs in the budget.

We’re pushing on with our manifesto commitment to roll them out in primary schools.

The clubs have a dual-purpose. Firstly, they’re proven to encourage attendance and attainment as they will ensure children start the day ready to learn.

Evidence shows that providing a healthy school breakfast at the start of the school day can contribute to increased concentration as well as improved wellbeing and behaviour.

At the same time, they will help parents at the beginning of the day. None of the primary schools local to me currently have nurseries or wraparound care. It’s hard to find childcare that is flexible enough to fit all of our needs, and that can limit the job opportunities for parents.

The first schools to trial these breakfast clubs will have the opportunity to shape the future of the national breakfast club policy and its implementation – I hope schools in Truro and Falmouth can be part of that and I’ll back local schools as they apply to take part.

Another important announcement from the Education Secretary last week was about children’s social care. There aren’t enough homes for the rising number of vulnerable children, forcing councils to pay extortionate costs to private children’s homes, with the largest 20 of these making an average profit of 23%. Some children are being placed in unsafe, unregistered placements, miles from their support networks.

The Government has set out a plan to take on this neglected crisis. Problems will be tackled earlier, supporting children closer to their families and diverting them from entering the social care system. When children can’t remain with immediate family, we’ll take steps to promote kinship care with wider family and friends, and fostering to reduce the number of children who are in placements away from their families. £44 million has been put aside in the budget to cover this.

We have to stop profits being made out of children’s lives.

By the time you read this MPs will have debated and voted on Kim Leadbeater MP’s assisted dying bill. The bill gives people who doctors have diagnosed with less than 6 months to live the choice to have assistance to end their lives if two doctors and a High Court judge agree. It is the night before the vote as I write this and after a great deal of thought and research and depending on what I hear tomorrow in the debate, I am minded to vote for the bill to go through to the next stage. Thank you for all the correspondence I have received from people in Truro and Falmouth on all sides of the debate. It is a very difficult decision and I appreciate the way people have contacted me with their thoughts and their own life experiences.

Jayne Kirkham

Labour MP for Truro and Falmouth