In any discussion about any Spending Review it is not long before we get to the issue of the investment case for preventative services. Interventions that can deliver better outcomes and at better value for the public purse than paying for the consequences of failure. All of our judgement says this case must be right. We often couple it with our belief in the potential of joined up, place based interventions and local knowledge to further add value to this type of work.

And yet it can remain a difficult argument to convert this into commitments by Government for longer term, more systematic reforms based on such models. One of the challenges is finding the upfront investment needed before the approach delivers the anticipated longer term service and financial benefits. Another has been that austerity has made it far harder to protect activities that can make a difference over a period, but which are discretionary and competing for resource with more immediate and statutory demands.