Not too long ago we came up with an idea to support single parents like ourselves, and others with caring responsibilities, who wanted to be more involved in Momentum – the organisation established to harness the energy after Jeremy Corbyn was first elected. We thought that any movement that claimed to bring people together to change politics should give everyone the opportunity to get involved – and too often, parents and carers are left out.

We found the Momentum national office supportive and helpful, and we agreed a comprehensive plan to ensure that single parents and sole carers (of whom there are many in our 18,000-strong organisation) have access to cooperatively run breakfast clubs, after-school sessions and the childcare they need to facilitate their political engagement.

As soon as this went public, we were met with a barrage of abuse. Just weeks after Shami Chakrabarti’s report rightly slammed spurious Nazi comparisons, our plan for accessible childcare was compared to the Hitler youth. “Tiny Trots” was the running headline on Sky News. We were accused of wanting to run Stalinist indoctrination camps for children, and met with the usual abuse and trolling that is now commonplace for women (and apparently, particularly leftwing women) on the internet. We were also accused of (somehow) distracting from the task of getting a Labour government in place that would provide childcare for all.

People might do well to remember that the last Labour government cut benefits for single parents in its first year of office. Vulnerable people need a Labour government, but Labour activists need to argue within our party for it to deliver on its promises once in power. A key way of doing that is ensuring our party is vibrant, welcoming and outward-looking on the ground – which is what Momentum Kids is about.

It’s laughable to suggest that we want to indoctrinate children – far from it. The children’s activities on offer will be about making positive change, creativity and discovery. Global charity WE (formerly Free the Children) runs “WE Day”, which has involved children making their own placards about issues that matter to them, in part to raise awareness of the plight of children in poorer countries. What we’re proposing will be no more threatening than that, and is likely to be much less ideological than even the Scouts.

And for older young people who might be interested in Momentum, there is a difference between indoctrination and political education. Indoctrination is about telling people what to think, whereas proper political education (practised by the Labour party since its foundation through initiatives like the National Council of Labour Colleges) is about providing a space for discussion, backed by access to educational resources, to facilitate participation among people who haven’t had access to a degree in politics.

That’s what Momentum’s festival, The World Transformed, at Labour’s conference in Liverpool is about – four days of arts, music, politics, culture and free events to open up politics. The kids programme on the opening day will include storytelling and sharing campaigning skills among young people. It will also host a creche on Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday.

When we campaign on an issue, it should be a given that factors such as accessibility are addressed in advance. As Audre Lord said, that there is no such thing as a single-issue campaign because we do not lead single-issue lives. The Labour party is there to bring together the different issues we experience and propose a coherent political programme of solutions, and then implement it in government. It cannot do that by treating elections as standalone events, won by a few weeks of knocking on doors to deliver a couple of key lines based on policies drawn up in spin rooms.

It has to be a living presence in people’s communities, gathering information, campaigning alongside and listening to people, and proving itself worthy of being handed the keys to power when it comes to election time. The false division created between “social movement” and “political party” has too often just been an excuse to mean “leave politics to the important people”.

That is why Momentum is needed: to find new ways of engaging and reaching out to people. And that’s why Momentum Kids is needed; to ensure that our efforts to reach out are inclusive and accessible, leaving no one behind.