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An opportunity for every child: how can we deliver the ambition of the Best Start in Life strategy?

Nesta at the Labour Party Conference

In A fairer start

28 Sep 2026 14:00 – 15:00

Nesta's pod, Liverpool Experience Campus (secure zone)

The Best Start in Life strategy sets out the UK government’s target to increase the number of children reaching a good level of development to 75% by 2028. Achieving this target will require improving services and support for families from pregnancy through the first five years of children’s lives.

Join Nesta’s fairer start mission at the Labour Party Conference to explore how to deliver the ambition of the Best Start in Life strategy. Our expert panel will be chaired by Moria Sloan, director of Nesta’s a fairer start mission and includes Louise Bazalgette director of Nesta’s a fairer start mission, Naomi Eisenstadt, former director of Sure Start, Haroon Chowdry, chief executive at the Centre for Young Lives and Sally Hogg, director of Start Strong

The panel will discuss how the UK can reach the 75% good level of development goal and make sure that every baby and young child has the opportunity to develop and thrive. We will explore how to ensure that the Opportunity Mission delivers its intended ambition and how we could go even further to raise the level of ambition in line with Sure Start. This session will also include insight and learnings from Nesta’s work with local authorities to develop and deliver their Best Start in Life plans.

This event will take place on Monday 28 September in Nesta’s pod at the Liverpool Experience Campus (secure zone) from 14:00-15:00 BST. Add to your calendar.

Moria Sloan

Moria heads up the fairer start mission, leading Nesta’s work to tackle early childhood inequalities. She also serves as an advisor at the Cabinet Office, where she previously held the role of deputy director for public sector innovation, supporting the Test, Learn and Grow programme. At Nesta, Moria has held several senior roles, including deputy director for the fairer start mission and chief of staff, where she supported organisational strategy, leadership and equity, diversity and inclusion. Before joining Nesta, Moria worked in the humanitarian sector, supporting people displaced by conflict and crisis around the world.

Louise Bazalgette

Louise works as part of a multi-disciplinary innovation team focused on narrowing the outcome gap for disadvantaged children. Previously, Louise was principal research advisor for Nesta’s Alliance for Useful Evidence. As part of this role, Louise was evidence lead in the development team for What Works for Children's Social Care (now Foundations), while it was incubated at Nesta. As part of this work, Louise developed the Centre’s Evidence Store. Louise has a background in promoting the use of evidence in policy and practice, having previously worked at the think tank Demos (2010 - 2013) and the NSPCC (2013 - 2018). At Demos Louise researched policy areas including parenting, the early years and children's social care. At the NSPCC, Louise led work on a system redesign project with local authorities to improve mental health outcomes for looked after children. She also led the development and evaluation of new services for children involved with children’s social care. This included working with children’s practitioners to develop a practice toolkit for direct work with children. Louise is passionate about the roles that research and evidence can play in improving people's lives. She is a trained researcher in both qualitative and quantitative methods, specialising in qualitative research with vulnerable groups. She completed an MSc in Psychology at Birkbeck, University of London in 2018.

Naomi Eisenstadt

Naomi Eisenstadt CB is currently a Non-Executive Board Member on the DfE Board and the DHSC Board. After an early career working in nurseries and in the voluntary sector, Naomi joined the civil service as the first Director of Sure Start. Her portfolio grew to include early education, childcare and family policy. After Sure Start she became Director of the Social Exclusion Task Force. Since leaving the civil service Naomi has served as Poverty Advisor to Scotland’s First Minister, published two books and served on a number of charity boards. She has had honorary research fellowships at Columbia University, University of Oxford, and the London School of Economics and is currently a trustee of the Education Endowment Foundation. Her main interests include child poverty and the social class gradient on outcomes for children and young people. She is hopeful that she can help facilitate cross government working between the DfE and DHSC in her non-executive board roles.

Haroon Chowdry

Haroon Chowdry is Chief Executive of the Centre for Young Lives, and a strong advocate for children and young people. Throughout his career he has used research and insights to drive policy change for children, families, and people facing social disadvantage. He joined from GambleAware where he was Director of Evidence & Insights, overseeing its work on inequalities and children and young people. Prior to this, he was Director of Evidence at the Children's Commissioner's Office, where he led its work on childhood vulnerability and oversaw all of its research and data-gathering. He also worked at the Early Intervention Foundation (now Foundations), where he developed approaches for assessing the costs and benefits of early intervention, as well as the costs of late intervention. He began his career at the Institute for Fiscal Studies, where he carried out research on education policy and early intervention.

Sally Hogg

Sally is Assistant Director of Programme and Impact at the Royal Foundation. She has had a varied career in charities and national and local governments, leading teams to develop and implement interventions for families in the early years, and campaigning successfully to drive policy change. Sally joined PEDAL from the Parent-Infant Foundation, where she was Deputy CEO and the creator and first chair of the First 1001 Days Movement, a campaigning alliance of over 200 charities and professional bodies. She is also a member of Thrive at Five’s Advisory council. Prior to this, Sally’s roles included Senior Policy Fellow at the Centre for Research on Play in Education, Development, and Learning (PEDAL) based in the Faculty of Education at the University of Cambridge, Strategic Lead at the Maternal Health Alliance, Senior Commissioner in a Local Authority, and Development Manager for Children Under One at the NSPCC.

An opportunity for every child: how can we deliver the ambition of the Best Start in Life strategy?

About Nesta

An opportunity for every child: how can we deliver the ambition of the Best Start in Life strategy?