Bright Horizons and Metropolitan Police open ninth ABE suite

The Bright Horizons Foundation for Children and the Metropolitan Police have celebrated the opening of their ninth Achieving Best Evidence (ABE) suite, at Camberwell Police Station in London.

Bright Spaces are the signature initiative of the Bright Horizons Foundation for Children, whose specific goal is to help children and families in crisis. 

Working with local communities, shelters and Bright Horizons clients, the aim of the foundation is to build stimulating spaces equipped with resourced bookshelves, games, toys and more for children of all ages. The Bright Spaces programme aims to create and support warm, enriching spaces within the community that provide children and families in need with a special place to play, have fun and most of all feel safe.

The Bright Space project in partnership with the Metropolitan Police has been focused on creating safe, child friendly spaces within ABE suites across Greater London.  During the project, volunteers from Bright Horizons create places of warmth, comfort and security for children enduring terrible circumstances by revitalising the suites used by detectives to interview children.

During the transformation of the suites, volunteers resource the spaces with age appropriate toys, games and books, a variety of soft furnishings and comfortable furniture and book cases.

Denise Priest, Director of Employer Partnerships and a board member of the Bright Horizons Foundation for Children, said, “The Bright Horizons Foundation for Children is very proud of its partnership with the MET Police’s Child Abuse Investigation Team and of the innovative Bright Spaces we have created together at the team’s interview suites. At a time when life can seem bleak, our Bright Spaces provide vulnerable children with a safe and welcoming place where they can relax and play – and simply enjoy being a child.”

Set up in 2005, the Bright Horizons Foundation for Children’s sole purpose is to help children and families in crisis.  They achieve this by working with local community groups, shelters and with Bright Horizons clients to create Bright Spaces®, which are indoor and outdoor play spaces located in homeless shelters, domestic violence refuges and refugee centres.

The spaces are created in order to provide children and families in need with a special place to play, have fun and most of all feel safe.