Chaired by EIF trustee and chair of the LGA Children and Young People’s Board, Cllr David Simmonds, the session took place at the LGA conference in Bournemouth.

Council leaders from across the country, including Manchester, Essex, Swindon, Oxfordshire, Blackburn with Darwen and Lambeth, came to discuss how to push the Early Intervention agenda forward in tough economic times.

Local authorities are facing a real challenge – demand is rising and budgets are falling – but it was suggested that a focus on innovation, new ways of working and integration could trigger a shift in the culture towards prevention. The determination and passion among all present to push forward this step change was striking and common challenges, as well as successes, were shared among the group.

Secretary of State Eric Pickles MP explained his department’s Troubled Families programme and its goal of “changing lives”. It was, he said, his proudest achievement in politics. He emphasised that “prevention was better than cure” and endorsed the Early Intervention Foundation’s work, as well as the efforts of many around the table to promote this agenda.

Louise Casey, Director General of Troubled Families made clear that the principles of early intervention must become engrained in services across the board, emphasising the need to change mind-set and not just layer on “boutique projects”. To truly help families, she said, we must think about issues, not services, systems or silos.

Islington Council leader Cllr Richard Watts explained that early intervention, for him, was not an option – but a route to financial survival. That it was about “canaries in the mine”, early warning signals which could prevent devastating and costly consequences.

Cheshire West and Chester Council described their “one front door model”, enabling services to work together to identify children who need additional help – and there was recent signs of success with a reduction in the number of children on child protection plans. Others were keen to understand how they got there.

Essex highlighted the importance preventing children from slipping into care, where it is much harder to have a positive impact on their future life chances. And they pointed out the elephant in the room – that it takes political leadership and buy-in to make early intervention a reality.

At the EIF our aim is to change the culture from late reaction towards one of Early Intervention – by early – we mean both early on in a child’s life or early on before a problem becomes entrenched. How much better to reach a child before she ends up in the care system or excluded from school? Better for the child, better for the family, better for society as a whole and less costly.

We will work with the political leaders who joined us yesterday – and others – to campaign for early intervention to transform the life chances of the children and families who brought us together. Our campaign reaches far and wide, across the services which early intervention can touch  – police, education, health – because it really is everyone’s business.