An anguish of agony aunts – that is the collective noun they have chosen for themselves – has been summoned to advise ministers on how to support children facing family breakdown.

At least 17 of the personal problem-solvers are backing the meeting in London next Thursday, which will discuss relationship education, adapting to a new baby in the household and ensuring that the problems faced by children of separating parents do not spill over into their schoolwork.

Ed Balls, the Children’s Secretary, said: “The adult relationship, for good or ill, has a very powerful impact on children and that’s something we have not thought about enough in the past.

“If you are six months off your GCSEs and your parents have a marital problem, that’s not going to do you much good.”

In addition to supporting children, he wanted to provide more support early on for warring parents.

The meeting follows a campaign called Kids in the Middle, run by four charities, Relate, Families Need Fathers, One Parent Families/Ginger-bread and the Fatherhood Institute. The campaign is calling for more and better counselling in schools to help children through family breakdown.

It also wants more services to help separating parents to work out their differences and better mediation to ensure that fewer cases of divorce and separation end up in court.

Deidre Sanders, agony aunt of The Sun, who is leading next week’s meeting, said it was vital that schools were made aware when children’s parents were splitting up and that more support was offered.

“There is so little support either for children or for parents, and the parents often don’t appreciate how badly it has affected their children,” she said.

“I know from my mailbag how staggeringly common it is that the problems that children and young people have can be dated back to their parents splitting up. All the time I hear from young people, ‘My mum and dad are always rowing. I can’t concentrate at school. My schoolwork is going down the pan’.

“If parents want to get back together again, they know they can go to an organisation like Relate. But if they are not going to get back together, there is nowhere for them to go,” she said.

Mr Balls disclosed details of the meeting yesterday as part of a package of measures aimed at improving child welfare, launched to mark the first anniversary of the department’s ten-year Children’s Plan.

As part of the plan, he has set up a taskforce to overhaul the training and management of social workers to put the profession on the same footing as teaching, which has been “trans-formed” over the past ten years. White-hall officials have said they will also insist that directors of children’s services in local authorities gain experience in schools and social work before they are appointed.

Sharon Shoesmith, the suspended director of children’s services at Harin-gey council, was previously a director of education and was criticised by her own staff for having little knowledge of social work when she became their boss.

Training schemes will be changed, with more emphasis on on-the-job learning and the introduction of a qualifying year in which new staff will get hands-on experience.

There will also be a new professional status for qualified youth workers.

Despite these initiatives, a progress report on children’s services found that the Government had missed many of its key targets for children.

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