To become effective health promoting establishments which achieve the maximum impact on children, young people and families and on the local community, schools and pre-school centres need to operate within a strategic framework developed at the highest levels within their local council and community area. Effective councils are committed to promoting health. They have high expectations of what establishments can achieve. They provide the practical support that is essential for effective health promotion. It is their responsibility with all their key partners to establish a strategic framework within which joint working can flourish. The development of health promoting schools requires local authorities to establish integrated processes for assessing needs, for service planning and for monitoring and evaluation. It is not enough for individual establishments and community groupings to develop effective partnerships at an operational level. To achieve sustainability and measurable impact, partnership projects need to be built into strategic planning at the highest levels and rigorously monitored through the authority's structures for accountability. Local authorities and key partners need to ensure that the development of health promoting schools is embedded in service planning, school planning and community planning. They need to establish clear links between initiatives and demonstrate how each initiative contributes to the development of health promoting establishments and consequently to better health outcomes for children. Similarly, effective health promoting schools provide important contributions to many other local and national initiatives. Local authorities and key partners themselves need to model the practice they expect to see in establishments by promoting and supporting the health of centrally deployed staff and making clear to establishments their responsibilities for doing the same within their own contexts. (Contains 2 footnotes.)