Opinion: Don't let Brown forget his early ideas

As 1999 came to an end there had been some general hints about the establishment of a new 'youth support service', foreshadowed both in the Social Exclusion Unit (SEU)'s Bridging the Gap and the then Department for Education and Employment (DfEE)'s Learning to Succeed. Both documents were published within weeks of each other during the summer of 1999.

Thus, by the beginning of 2000, we were waiting for the detail. It came, first, in the form of the Connexions Strategy, a DfEE initiative launched in mid-February. Given its subsequent less-than-hoped-for effectiveness, the rush to embrace it should have been more measured, especially when the SEU was finalising its own proposals. These were launched at the end of that March and included the recommendation for a cross-governmental unit covering issues affecting children and young people.