Fighting for every child’s right to read

Research consistently shows that shared reading strengthens family bonds, builds emotional resilience, boosts early brain development, increases academic success and helps our children develop empathy, creativity and imagination. However, driven by economic pressures, overstretched parents and the relentless pull of screens, early shared reading is in decline.

In his new role as reading rights ambassador for BookTrust, Frank Cottrell-Boyce set out to correct this with the Reading Rights campaign, an initiative launched by BookTrust to ensure that all children have access to the life-changing benefits of shared reading.

BookTrust’s Reading Rights campaign recognises the vital importance of trusted services and people across the early years sector, including local authorities, early years education, health and third-sector providers.

Frank describes health visitors in particular as the “ninjas of early years work”. He says: “I’m completely convinced by the way that the absolute best thing you could do is just have more health visitors [...] They really know what they’re doing and they are, unlike nearly every other profession now, experts who are still trusted.”

Once the backbone of our community, services like this are shutting down. BBC analysis has shown the number of health visitors in England has fallen from 10,200 a decade ago to 5,575 in January 2026 – a drop of 45%. And it’s not just increasing these services that’s important; Frank believes the most effective way to create a literacy-rich environment is by “bringing services together" creating a “golden thread of reading” between educational, social and health services.

BookTrust has termed this the ‘ecosystem of reading’, envisioning a joined-up approach across the community, involving antenatal services, health visitors, midwives, library services, GP practices, third-sector providers and Family Hubs.

Frank, together with BookTrust, will continue to champion the campaign loudly and persistently to achieve this and to build the momentum needed for real change, engaging key people across local and national government, policy and the wider early years landscape. This means:

• pressing for stronger workforce training
• ensuring that early childhood reading is embedded into policy
  
• expanding access to high-quality, representative books
  
• sharing research and evidence in ways that drives meaningful change
  
• encouraging multi-agency leadership to embed reading models that transform local early years experiences
  

BookTrust will also be building on pilot schemes they have been running with local partners to increase access and support for shared reading.

There is no better person than Frank to partner with BookTrust on this important project. He is described by the charity as “a lifelong champion of children’s books” and has spent his children’s laureate tenure on the frontline of early development, advocating for those who need stories the most.

Throughout his career, Frank has used his platform to champion the message that access to books is not just a pleasant pastime, but an essential and fundamental right, one that dates back to the very beginning of human existence.

When asked if the needle is beginning to move for children’s right to read, Frank says: “We’ve not so much moved the needle as widened the window” by opening up a dialogue “about all the broader benefits that are beyond and in addition to the obvious educational benefits”. After all, he says its “creating connection [and] shared moments that first got us telling stories around the fire before history began”.

Frank’s career has given him a deep insight into the power of shared reading. He notes that “the book is the menu, not the meal”, a reminder that stories create a feast of imagination. When a parent and child sit down to enjoy a story together, they are setting the child’s mind free to wonder, create and explore.

Frank describes modern life as “overwhelming” and says that by reading together, families are “slowing the world down” for their child, helping them to “build familiarity with the things around them”. He says it’s “fine, in fact necessary, for [children] to tread the same story over and over again”. 

By opening up these worlds together, children build confidence, empathy and the emotional resilience they need to grow. And Frank has seen this tenacity in action: “A little girl stopped me outside Spellow Library just after it had been burned down in the riots. ‘Frankie,’ she said, ‘listen to what I can do.’ And she recited the Jabberwocky. That sense of swagger and ownership [...] while standing outside the burnt library – that was everything.”

Without the benefits of early shared reading, children face a disadvantage that can easily be passed onto the next generation. It is this cycle that Frank and BookTrust are determined to break.

Frank said: “This is urgent. Childhood is fleeting. We do not know what future we are sending our children into, but we do know this: they will need to know how to be happy. And we have in our hands one of the most powerful tools for building the apparatus of happiness that humans have ever invented – books.”

To join the Reading Rights movement and receive the latest news from the campaign, register your details at bit.ly/U5-readingrights.