FOUR children's centres in a borough have been upgraded to 'Family Hubs' using £2.9million of government cash.

The new venues will bring different services and professionals together in one place convenient for parents and their offspring.

The four Blackburn with Darwen Council centres converted are Little Harwood, Shadsworth, Livesey and Darwen.

The hubs will offer support from conception through to age 19, or up to 25 for children with special education needs and disabilities.

Parents will also be able to access a range of support through the hubs from midwifery to mental health support, health visiting to infant feeding advice.

They also provide early language and communication development for young children to prepare them for school at age five.

Last week saw the launch of Family Hub Little Harwood, with Blackburn with Darwen Mayor Cllr Parwaiz Akhtar cutting the ribbon to declare it officially open.

Blackburn with Darwen Council education boss Cllr Julie Gunn said: "In Blackburn with Darwen we know that the first 1,001 critical days, from conception to age two, is a time of rapid development. This is why we are committed to providing holistic early help and care for all our families.

“The purpose of our hubs is connection – services, professionals and sectors working together.

“As far as reasonably possible, the family hub model has been designed on a neighbourhood footprint and preserves the strength built around our current network approach to continue to achieve the best economy of scale financially.

“These four chosen sites are already the largest and facilitate the widest range of services out of all eight centres."

The council was awarded a grant of £2.9million from the government's Family Hubs and Start for Life funding package to pay for the change.

Maria Nugent, the borough's early years’ service lead, said: "We are working with parents and carers to ensure that our family hubs and children centres are a clear, simple point of access for help and support."