Prevention is better than cure

I've been spending quite a lot of time on trains travelling to meetings and speaking at conferences on behalf of ADCS recently. This has given me some valuable time to do some reading (as well as the obligatory emails!), but it also leaves time for reflection.

During the Northampton to Taunton leg of my journey I read some highlights from the debate on serious violence in the House of Commons earlier this week. The discussion was rich and wide ranging. Cuts to policing in both monetary and workforce terms featured regularly but so too did the impact of youth services being scaled right back; school exclusions; the closure of children's centres; the use of unsustainable grant funding to tackle complex issues; the loss of family support services and disinvestment in youth offending teams. As a director of children's services and a local systems leader, these matters are never far from my mind but they don't often seem to feature on Westminster's agenda despite the Home Secretary describing the levels of violence on our streets as "a national emergency."