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Labour would open 1,000 Sure Start centres to boost young families, Jeremy Corbyn has announced.

Some 1,000 of the vital community centres were shut under Tory cuts, despite young parents hailing them as a lifeline as they raised their children.

Labour would also boost free childcare to 30 hours a week for all children aged 2 to 4 - far more than the Tories offer. The Tories only offer it for working parents of those aged 3 or 4, and some others.

Mr Corbyn, who will unveil the pledges in Leeds, said: “The Conservatives are failing a whole generation of children.

“Labour will deliver the real change Britain needs.

“Parents are struggling to afford the childcare support they need, while many children are going hungry and growing up homeless.

“Labour will open a Sure Start centre in every community and fund 30 hours’ free childcare for all two to four-year-olds to unlock the potential of every child.”

Shadow Education Secretary Angela Rayner, who had her first baby as a teenager, said at a rally: “When I was 16 and I had my son I went to a Sure Start centre, one of the first under the last Labour government, and I can honestly say that Sure Start centre made me a better mum.

(Image: Christopher Furlong)

“It taught me how important it was to sit with my child and give them cuddles and to read to them.

“You gave me a gift to be a better mum than my mum had the ability to be - and you changed the life of my children.

“That’s what Labour does when we’re in government.”

She added: “I was that kid who grew up in a council house.

“My mum was from Wythenshawe and couldn’t read or write.

“I left school without qualifications, pregnant at 16. I felt ashamed of who I was.

(Image: PA)

“I felt I was nothing, and I remember at the time there was a Tory minister at the time saying girls like me were getting pregnant to get council housing.

“That’s what they think.”

In June, a report by the Institute for Fiscal Studies found Sure Start centres brought “big benefits for children’s health”.

Aimed at improving early years health and education, they were launched 20 years ago as a flagship of Tony Blair ’s Labour Party.

The study found that for every one Sure Start centre per thousand children there were 5,500 fewer hospital admissions for 11-year-olds each year.