City of York Council's Early Years and Childcare service has plenty to celebrate this Christmas. 'The 2003 Sure Start Partners in Excellence Awards' saw the service add another accolade to their collection of awards.

The Department for Education and Skills (DfES) held the awards on Tuesday, 9 December, at the Atrium in London. Open to local authorities working in co-operation with partner organisations, the awards aim to identify excellence, innovation and success in the development and delivery of quality services to children and families.

This is the third of these awards the service has won since it was formed in 2000. It has also won two other awards for Quality and the Childrens Information Service.

Cherie Blair and Baroness Ashton presented the award, which was collected on behalf of the city by Rosemary Flanagan and Barbara Clarke from the Early Years service. The award, in the 'Smarter Childrens Services' category, recognises the work of the Shared Foundation Community Partnerships. Work is being done to reshape the Early Years Development and Childcare Partnership and the Shared Foundation Project board.

Heather Marsland, manager of the Early Years and Childcare Service, said: "This award belongs to everyone in the city of York. People from schools, childminders, pre-school playgroups and private day nurseries and colleagues from other council departments have worked hard to form the Shared Foundation Community Partnership model.

"The next step is to widen the brief of partnerships to include the voices of parents, carers and children and professionals from health, social services and other agencies in line with the new legislation 'Every Child Matters'. We would like to thank everyone in the city who worked so hard to gain this accolade for York."