‘An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure'.  Most reading this will be familiar with this phrase, which is no surprise given its genesis dates back to De Legibus, 1240. I also grew up with my mother telling me discerningly that ‘a stitch in time saves nine' – a proverb first recorded by Thomas Fuller in 1732. 

Fast forward centuries, then, to 2002. In my then new role an assistant director I was working in a team spearheaded by Mike Cooney to transform social care in Trafford. With ‘Modernising Social Care' – the policy document of the time – and the introduction of a suite of performance indicators, local authorities were awarded several of specific grants, viz: partnership, carers and prevention.