Making Every Adult Matter lauched its four-point manifesto for tackling multiple needs and exclusions at the 2009 party conferences. Two breakfast events were very well attended by delegates, who joined Ministers and guest speakers to discuss a national policy framework for multiple needs and exclusions.
Read more about MEAM’s first conference season in the conference blog, below.
Labour Party Conference, Brighton
Phil Hope MP, Minister for Care Services, was joined by Eilias Lawlor, New Economics Foundation; Danny Mitchell, Revolving Doors Agency National Service User Forum; Representatives from Making Every Adult Matter and a wide range of delegates.
Conservative Party Conference, Manchester
At the Conservative event, co-hosted by the Centre for Social Justice, delegates heard from David Burrowes MP, Shadow Justice Secretary; Christian Guy, The Centre for Social Justice; Danny Mitchell, Revolving Doors Agency National Service User Forum; Eilis Lawlor, New Economics Foundation; and representatives from Making Every Adult Matter.
Conference Blog
Follow MEAM at the party conferences.
Conservative:
Monday 5 October
MEAM is back on the party conference trail in Manchester with the Conservatives. We’ll be launching our four-point manifesto for the next parliament on Wednesday morning in an event co-hosted with the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) and are looking forward to a range of other fringe events and meetings.
At lunchtime I attended the first of these, a joint event between Turning Point and DrugScope entitled Acting Early in Social Care. The debate covered a range of issues, including how we move towards more preventative services and how we can best design, commission and provide services for people with multiple needs. Mark Harper MP and Crispin Blunt MP took copies of the MEAM four-point manifesto, as did the Chief Executive of Turning Point, Lord Victor Adebowale.
The next event was on Prison Reform, hosted by the Centre for Social Justice. A panel including Dominic Grieve MP, Shadow Justice Secretary, and Jonathan Aitken, who chaired the recent CSJ Prison Reform Working Group, outlined interesting proposals for increasing rehabilitation and reducing re-offending within the criminal justice system. After the event I gave Dominic Grieve MP a copy of the four-point manifesto and spoke about how the ideas outlined for criminal justice could be fed into a cross-government strategy for people with multiple needs.
In the evening I represented MEAM at the Health Hotel reception where Andrew Lansley MP gave a brief speech.
Tuesday 6 October
The morning started with Grant Shapps MP, Shadow Housing Minister, delivering his speech to the conference. He’s also spoken at homelessness related fringe events such as yesterday’s event by St Mungo’s and Crisis entitled Will the Conservatives be the Party to end homelessness?
Two fringe seminars today about public service reform. At lunchtime an event was hosted by the RSA and IPSOS Mori, in association with the 2020 Public Services Trust, a new think tank looking at medium-term strategic public service reform. The debate centred around how public services can be reformed to cope with a tighter fiscal environment and Philip Hammond MP, Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury spoke about creating an environment in which local services can innovate and tackle local problems effectively. After the event I had a brief chat with Philip and he took a copy of the four-point manifesto. Our discussion touched on the Total Place initiative (more detail below) and the work of Sir Michael Bichard at the Institute of Government, both leads that we will follow up.
Later in the afternoon I attended an event hosted by Demos, with Francis Maude MP, who is writing the Conservative manifesto, and David Halpern, formerly at the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit and now at the Institute of Government. The debate was about how a future government could balance local flexibility versus state responsibility and control – subjects of Demos’ new report Leading From the Front. I mentioned in the question session that our four-point manifesto was about creating a framework in which local areas could develop effective services for people with multiple needs and I had discussion with Francis Maude MP and David Halpern afterwards, as well as with Clare Tyler, now at Relate but previously at the Social Exclusion Unit. It would be great to look at how we could take forward some work with the Institute of Government in the future.
Wednesday 7 October
This morning we held our fringe event, co-hosted with the Centre for Social Justice, where we launched the MEAM four-point manifesto to the Conservative conference.
An audience of 36 delegates heard from David Burrowes MP, Shadow Justice Minister; Dan Mitchell, Revolving Doors Agency National Service User Forum; Eilis Lawlor, New Economics Foundation; Christian Guy, Centre for Social Justice; and representatives from MEAM. Jonathan Aitken MP also joined the audience.
David Burrowes spoke knowledgably about the issues faced by people with multiple needs and welcomed the formation of the Coalition and the points in our manifesto. Christian also welcomed the manifesto and made links to current work underway at the Centre for Social Justice. Eilis outlined ways in which we can better measure the effect of the services we provide and Dan gave an excellent speech about his experiences. We’ll be working with them all, as well as with many others who attended today, as the Conservatives begin to lay out their election manifesto plans for tackling social exclusion.
After a brief meeting on a separate piece of work I attended a final fringe this afternoon hosted by Demos entitled Are the Tories serious about Social Justice. There was a large audience and Mark Harper MP stated that this was a key issue for the Conservative party.
Later, MEAM held a brief private meeting with James Brokenshire MP, Shadow Minister for Home Affairs, to give him a copy of the manifesto and discuss its content. The Shadow Minister made helpful comments and we asked him to keep the Coalition in mind as Conservative manifesto plans are discussed.
Overall, MEAM has had a very successful first conference season and it’s clear that there is appetite across the political spectrum and at local and national level, for addressing multiple needs. It’s going to be a busy six months for politicians as we enter the run up to the election and MEAM is looking forward to ensuring that multiple needs and exclusions and our four-point manifesto are at the centre of every party’s manifesto debate.
Labour:
Monday 28 September
It’s the first party conference season since Making Every Adult Matter (MEAM) was born and we’re here to launch our four-point manifesto for the next parliament on tackling multiple needs and exclusions. Our main event is tomorrow morning, but we’ll be using the rest of the time to meet as many decision makers as we can.
Today both Ed and David Miliband received a copy of the four-point manifesto report. Ed is drafting Labour’s manifesto and his office have offered us a chance to follow up. David made a major speech on multiple needs and exclusions back in 2005, which has framed much of the resulting work on the issue, so it was great that he could see the early results of our organisations’ collaboration.
MEAM has also been represented at a Fabian Society event on social housing with John Healy MP and at the Crisis and St. Mungos fringe on worklessness and social exclusion with Helen Goodman MP.
Tuesday 29 September
It’s launch day for the MEAM four-point manifesto. Our breakfast fringe event attracted around 35 delegates – a great turnout. Phil Hope MP, Dan Mitchell from Revolving Doors Agency National Service User Forum and Eilias Lawlor from the New Economics Foundation provided thoughtful speeches, followed by around 40 minutes of debate.
The Minister discussed the four-points of the manifesto, welcomed the work of the coalition and asked us to follow up with him . Thanks to Dehavilland for providing full coverage of the event and to all the speakers for helping us launch our four-point manifesto for the next parliament.
Our press release on the launch is available. Coverage so far comes from Community Care and Community Newswire, Public Net and Inside Housing
This afternoon I attended a Fabian Society event on poverty after the credit crunch. I raised the issue of multiple needs and Yvette Cooper MP took a copy of our manifesto as she left the venue.
In the evening I heard part of an event hosted by the Social Market Foundation and the Institute for Government at which Liam Byrne MP, Sir Michael Bichard, and Peter Riddell of The Times discussed public service reform in an era of austerity. MEAM will follow up with Liam Byrne MP and Sir Michael Bichard when back in London.
Wednesday 30 September
A shorter day today – I attended an event on Total Place, hosted by the Leadership Centre for Local Government. Mayor Sir Steve Bullock, Lewisham Borough Council and Cllr Iain Malcom, Leader of South Tyneside Metropolitan Borough Council discussed their involvement in the Total Place pilots that look at how a ‘whole area’ approach to public services can lead to better services at less cost by identifying and avoiding overlap and duplication between organisations.
After a quick look round the exhibition stands it was time to head back on the train. It’s been a good first conference for MEAM – lots of leads to follow up and a successful launch for our manifesto report.
