Lecture to focus on early intervention in child-care

Graham AllenGraham Allen, who was the driving force behind the establishment of the Early Intervention Foundation, will discuss “Early Intervention-why leave it so late?” on Tuesday 6th February 2018 at 6 pm in the Eric Sunderland (MALT) Lecture Theatre, Bangor University. This is the annual Anne Marie Jones 2018 Memorial Lecture organized by the Children’s Early Intervention Trust, based at Bangor University. The public Lecture is free to attend and open to all.

Graham Allen represented the highly disadvantaged Nottingham North constituency, where he was born, as MP for 30 years from 1987-2017.

Professor Judy Hutchings of the Centre for Evidence Based Early Intervention at Bangor University’s School of Psychology said:

“We are extremely fortunate to have Graham to speak ahead of our Annual Conference about his passion for early intervention and the challenges that we face in ensuring equality of opportunity for all of our children. He has been the most influential voice for Early Intervention for socially disadvantaged children for much of his time in parliament. He was a vociferous MP on behalf of his constituency and early intervention to support families, and this became his driving passion, devoting much of his time to promoting early intervention nationally.”

As Graham Allen explains:

“Early Intervention as an idea has been nurtured in the field of babies, children and young people….. Early intervention covers a raft of policies around the 0 to 18 age cycle. These policies are designed to break the intergenerational continuum of deprivation, under-achievement and poverty of aspiration. The foundation of this approach is to promote social and emotional capability in babies, children and young people. It is only with this bedrock that they will go further with their language skills and academic attainment and go on equipped to raise great families of their own.”

Graham became the executive role of Chair of Nottingham’s Local Strategic Partnership in 2005 launching One Nottingham, Britain’s first “Early Intervention City”. In 2007 he wrote the highly influential “Early Intervention: good parents, great kids, better citizens“ with Iain Duncan-Smith underlining his reputation for getting things done by working cross party.

In July 2010, in response to a request from Prime Minister, David Cameron, he carried out an Independent Review of Early Intervention for Her Majesty’s Government, producing two influential reports, “Early Intervention: the next steps” (January 2011) and Early Intervention: Smart Investment, Massive Savings, (July 2011). Professor Hutchings contributed to these reports and Bangor University’s early intervention work was recognised.

The reports resulted in funding for a national Early Intervention Foundation that was launched in February 2013 with Graham as its chair. 

Publication date: 24 January 2018