UofG Centre for Public Policy

STOP Lightning Talk by Fiona McFarlane, Policy Advisor NESTA Scotland 

With the overall resource budget growing slowly, we are entering a period defined by incredibly difficult political and financial decisions. We can no longer afford to fund everything, and our focus must shift from what we can afford to do, to where our limited money is best spent. 

This means we are not just debating education policy; we are making a choice between competing investment priorities - between Education and Skills and Health and Social Care. These are tortured decisions, but ones that we need to confront.  

For a decade, "closing the attainment gap" has been a central pillar of Scottish social policy, backed by over £1billion of dedicated funding through the Attainment Scotland Fund. While we see signs of progress - limited, but present - we must be honest: at the current rate of change, we are decades away from "closing" that gap. We are failing to see a transformative shift because we are asking the education system to solve a problem that is not, at its heart, an education problem. 

By waiting until a child is five or six to intervene, we are paying an enormous premium to try and fix a developmental delay that has happened on the changing mat or in the highchair. Evidence tells us that the early years matter most. The foundational architecture of a child’s brain is built long before the first school bell rings.  If we want to track outcomes, let's look at our 5-year-olds, not just the number of National 5s they may or may not go on to get. We must address the issue at its root. 

Our flagship move in the early years has been the 1,140 hours of childcare. As a labor-market and cost of living policy, it may well be a success; it can help all families get back to work and ease the cost of living. It's a good thing. But what we can’t say is that this is a "child development" intervention and we know that developmental concern rates are rising. At the 4-5 year review: concern rates have increased from 13% in 2019/20 to 18% in 2023/24. The poverty related attainment gaps exist at this age as well, with children in Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation zone 1 two and a half times more likely to be identified with a concern than those in wealthier areas. And what is a child development concern? It's about a child’s ability to communicate, to play, ability to grip and hold small objects and toileting. All fundamental to effective participation at school.   

And yet our offer to families in the early years is largely transactional. Early learning provides a place for a child to be. But the evidence tells us that what matters for closing the gap isn't just the quantity of hours; it’s the quality of the environment, the finances of the family, the home in which they live, the stress in that home and the ability of care givers (parents) to provide nurture and love. That is not to say that the early learning and childcare offer is wrong, but we are funding 'slots', and not sufficiently funding the intensive, relationship-based support that helps a struggling parent and a child bond. 1,140 hours is a great support for the economy, but on its own, it is an insufficient foundation for a child's brain. 

Then when children go to school we are asking schools and the huge attainment fund to fix these issues. It's hard to look at the outcomes and say that this approach is working. By pushing funding to thousands of individual schools, we’ve created a fragmented landscape of 'micro-interventions'. If it's a prevention pot of funding it's happening far too late.   

Now, I want to be clear. If a future Government decides to move away from attainment funding, stopping these things will be incredibly difficult. In every school, there is a project that is loved by staff and valued by pupils. But in a time of restricted resources and slow budget growth, good can be the enemy of impactful. We have a billion-pound pot filled with valued projects that, collectively, are not moving the national needle fast enough. 

If budget decisions are made within portfolios then closing the gap means being clear-eyed: we cannot fund everything. When the overall resource budget is growing very slowly the only way to succeed is to stop funding the acute end of the crisis and start funding the foundations of child development. That is politically hard as we will not see the fruits of that investment for many years to come. But in straightened times we can’t keep doing what we know isn’t working. That starts with shifting the funding allocation and putting it towards families with children under 5 with a clear focus on building and sustaining family relations and reducing stress. 

Let’s stop asking teachers to do the impossible. Let’s stop thinking that supporting attainment starts at 4 or 5 and start investing in the human brain before the first school bell ever rings. 

Author and about this blog 

STOP Lightning Talk by Fiona McFarlane, Policy Advisory NESTA Scotland 

This is a written copy of a talk that was delivered at the University of Glasgow Centre for Public Policy’s event Stop/Start: Making Public Service Reform Stick in Scotland, on Monday 19 January 2026. 

It was part of a set of STOP talks, quick fire provocations from leaders in this space, challenging attendees to think about what’s not working and should be stopped. 

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First published: 11 February 2026