Welcome to my journal.
Get an insight into my day-to-day work and my perspective on key issues.
Hope Starts Young: Why Labour must tell the story of a better tomorrow
First published on Labour List on 13th July 2025. HERE.
In politics, as in business, ideas only stick when they tell a story. A government can have the right policies, but without a unifying narrative, those actions risk landing as fragments—not a future.
Labour has already taken bold steps: a New Deal for Working People, GB Energy, rail renationalisation, planning reform. But it hasn’t yet clearly answered the bigger question: why is it doing all this? Indeed, some suggest it doesn’t really know why.
I believe the answer is simple and powerful: Labour should be the party that helps young people and young families believe—deep down—that tomorrow can be better than yesterday. We don’t just need a programme or a series of policies. We need a purpose. Hope Starts Young.
Investing in Play: Why Every Pound Spent on Childhood Play Pays Economic Dividends
As the UK grapples with sluggish productivity, rising healthcare costs, and widening inequalities, we should ask a fundamental question: are we giving our children – the very people who will drive tomorrow’s economy – the right start in life?
One of the simplest, yet most overlooked levers we have to improve our future prosperity is play.
Yes, play.
The Raising The Nation Play Commission - Six Months in….
First published on the Raising the Nation Play Commission website 3 February 2025. HERE
Incredibly, we are already into the second half of our year-long Raising the Nation Play Commission. Time is flying by, but we’ve already packed so much in, including…
A National Youth Strategy is very welcome news
Yesterday, the Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy announced that the government would create a new National Youth Strategy to break down barriers to opportunity for young people.
Her statement mattered but it came as no surprise. The life chances of young people are crucially important for the nation and the government’s strategy will bring both funding and focus. Improving those life chances is vital to success in the Government delivering on its mission to break down barriers to opportunity, but I also know that it has long been a personal mission for this particular Secretary of State.
Where have all the childhoods gone?
Anne Longfield CBE and I wrote this article about how play has disappeared from childhoods, and why it is critical to reverse the trend - citing the Raising the Nation Play Commission that we launched in June 2024 as our commitment to see the change we demand is delivered.
How our next government can deliver a manifesto for children
In this article -written during the 2024 General Election campaign, I reflect on what an incoming government could do for children over 10 weeks, 10 months and 10 years.
Launching the ‘Raising the Nation’ Play Commission
Politicians should ask how our children can thrive: how they can feel significant, be confident, have life affirming childhoods and become the people that they each have the potential to be.
Because thriving childhoods reflect thriving societies, and as play is central to thriving childhoods, it should be central to political decision-making. The way children explore, experiment and build an understanding of the world really matters.
Only Labour can deliver the stability businesses need
Under the Conservatives, entrepreneurs have lived with chaos, drama and – from time to time – farce. Stability will give business leaders confidence and with confidence comes growth.
Why investment in Public Service Children’s Media is so is vital - especially now.
High quality British children’s content will become scarce and could become extinct. Parents, politicians and producers all have a role to play here – but all need to step up before it’s too late. As well as our great tradition of making high quality British media for children, we risk losing our heritage of growing new producers and writers. Once the traditional, regulated broadcasters and their budgets are no longer being found by children, who will pay for this vital element of our children’s nourishment?
How Labour can unleash our entrepreneurs and kick-start growth
Trickle-down economics has failed and continues to fail, and our economy has stopped growing. We are the only G7 nation to still have an economy smaller than it was pre-pandemic. And the IMF recently forecast that the UK will be among the worst performing economies in the G20 in 2023.
So what can Labour propose in order to avoid another decade of low growth and lots of inequality? ….
…. An entrepreneurial mindset places value in curiosity and innovation, constantly iterating for building growth and cultivating meaningful relationships, partnerships and collaborations.
