Now, the points that you've just made on the importance of supporting dads in their role were very well made. The organisation Dads Can will be pleased that they've got a champion here in this Welsh Parliament to highlight their achievements, celebrate their work in this Parliament of Wales and to advocate as well, as you've just done, for their future ambitions as well. It's lovely to have them in the gallery here this evening. 

Now, we know that parents come from many different backgrounds, cultures, beliefs—families come in many and different and varied forms. But research tells us one very important thing they all have in common is that they are the greatest influence on their children's lives. The evidence, indeed, also shows that dads who are interested and supportive of their children can make a truly positive difference to their outcomes. These children are more likely to have better language development, higher educational attainment, fewer behavioural problems and be more all-round resilient. Advances in neuroscience have shown the significance of positive stimulation and nurturing from mums and dads during the first 1,000 days of brain development. And in their school years, a dad's involvement has a big impact on a child's achievements and ambitions.

Supportive dads and mums also have a key role as a buffer against adversity. Without protective factors and the support from a strong and nurturing parent, those stressful, traumatic experiences that do occur during childhood—adverse childhood experiences, which Nick has referred to in the work of Dads Can—may cause problems both immediately early on and later throughout life.

And the couple relationship, whether, quite frankly, parents are together or apart, is also an important factor. When conflict between parents is not resolved, it can put a child's mental health and long-term life chances at risk, but we also know that where it's handled well, the adverse impacts are minimised. That's why supporting families and parenting are at the heart of our agenda as a Government. And as Members here will be aware, one of the five key priority areas in the strategy 'Prosperity for All' is early years. And key to this is the role of all parents—mums and dads. We want children from all backgrounds to have the very best start in life, to reach their potential and to lead healthy, prosperous, fulfilling lives. So, this financial year, I've committed £325,000 to support our parenting 'Give it Time' campaign, and the campaign provides good-quality information to help parents develop positive parenting skills, through the website, Facebook, the digital advertising and a range of materials. And we're not telling parents, by the way, how to raise their children; what we're doing is promoting positive parenting strategies and providing tips even on handling specific issues like toddler tantrums—we've all had them; as a parent myself—potty training, and so on and so on. And parenting support, we know, the evidence shows that it can give both mums and dads a greater understanding of child development and provide ideas of how to praise and reward their child, how to set limits, how to handle misbehaviour, and without resorting, I have to say, to physical punishment.

Supporting individuals to adopt positive parenting styles is an integral part of both our Flying Start and the Families First programmes. But, sometimes, parents are unable to live together, and we know that parental separation affects many children and their families across Wales. Private law cases involving separating parents often involve disputes over child-related arrangements—for example, where the child should live and who he or she should see. It is important that families are provided with support when parental separation occurs in order to help them remain focused on the needs of their child rather than the dispute between themselves. And the child always has to be at the centre of our concerns. We fully support the principle that a child is entitled to a meaningful relationship with both parents following family separation where it's safe and in the child's best interests. And supporting the couple relationship, whether they're together or apart, is very important. It's why it's a growing feature of our family support programmes. Last year, we provided funding to train the family support workforce so they're better able to embed parental conflict support in the wider services for families.

Now, while local authorities have responsibility for deciding the precise nature of local service delivery, we do expect them to be steered by our parenting support guidance, which places an emphasis on services that work holistically for the whole family. The focus of our guidance is not only on what parenting support to provide, but also on how it should be provided. It includes practical strategies for accommodating the particular needs of fathers. And, as Nick has outlined, they can, for a variety of reasons, be less engaged than mothers in family support, sometimes for the reasons I've outlined already. So, the guidance, therefore, gives practitioners lots of ideas for engaging fathers, which are based on published research from fathers themselves as well and from practitioners experienced in working in the field with dads. We expect local authorities to actively promote family support services to dads and support their engagement. And there are some really good examples of where they're providing dedicated groups specifically tailored to the needs of dads. So, in Swansea, for example, they have a supportive dads programme, and they have a dads community group, very much in the style, actually, of the Dads Can project that we're discussing here tonight. And recently, I congratulated Swansea on receiving a Royal College of Midwives award for their excellent Jigsaw project. It's a joint Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University Local Health Board and Swansea local authority project, jointly funded through Families First and Flying Start, and it provides women and their partners, during pregnancy and until their child's third birthday, with support. It's been hugely successful in increasing, for example, rates of breastfeeding, reducing rates of smoking, and it has also reported a number of families no longer needing support from statutory services. So, it's win-wins all around.

But local authorities, Nick, have responsibility for deciding the precise nature of local service delivery, depending on local circumstances and identified needs within their own areas. So, with that in mind, and hearing the strong representations that he has made this evening, and the celebration of the work of Dads Can, I urge the Member for Monmouthshire to liaise with the local authority to understand whether Dads Can, or similar projects, could help meet the needs that they have identified in their area.