Letters to the Editor: Time to act on early intervention

Graham Allen's review makes some pertinent suggestions into how best to tackle social challenges and make long-term savings in the process. However, there have been a number of reviews similar to this and now it is important for political leadership to be applied to early intervention.

Early intervention services are vital to society and we support the proposal to increase funding for them by one per cent each year. It is true that we are living in difficult economic times but if we fail to act now, our children are likely to suffer disproportionately.

Lord Victor Adebowale, chief executive, Turning Point

Speech and language support

Raising awareness of the issues of language and communication in young people at secondary school is not enough. We have to also ensure that there is support in place to ensure these needs are met. Delegates at our conference last month indicated that more training and support is needed in secondary schools and schools need to have access to programmes and interventions that work for this group.

We have come a long way since the last major survey of services to support young people with speech, language and communication needs in 2000, but it is important not to lose this momentum.

We know the relationship between language, literacy skills and learning continues to be important during the secondary years, so a continued focus on supporting young people's language skills in secondary school is very important, despite increasing pressure on local services.

Mary Hartshorne, head of quality and outcomes, I Can

Benefits going unclaimed

Although everyone has been feeling the pinch of the recession for some time now, the findings by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation really bring home how punishing the last 12 months have been.

Research that Turn2us published at the height of the recession showed that 53 per cent of people in the UK had experienced a fundamental change to their working conditions including a decrease in working hours, change in salary or job loss. Yet, the level of unclaimed benefits currently stands at £19.18bn, suggesting that awareness of the money available to people who are struggling to make ends meet is low.

At this time of major financial pressures, it is more important than ever that people regularly check their eligibility for support. Anyone can visit our free website www.turn2us.org.uk to carry out a benefits check in confidence to find out what welfare benefits they may be entitled to and whether there are charitable grants for which they are eligible.

Alison Taylor, director, Turn2us

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