High-profile concerns about youth crime and child protection may also divert funding from services.
Judith Smyth, the director of the Department for Children, Schools and Families' commissioning support programme for local authorities, claimed preventive services could be "starved of resources".
Speaking at the Children's Services Network conference, Every Child Matters Five Years On, she said: "We have to go back to common sense and say surely a stitch in time saves nine. Outcomes for children who do need high-level services are not that good, so we have to rethink preventive services."
Smyth also said she feared the aftermath of the Baby P case would divert funding from preventive services, due to a knee-jerk emphasis on emergency child protection.
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