One thing we know for sure. Sure Start is a good thing. What we also know for sure is that the best childcare in the world can't cure the worst places in the world. Why would anyone think that Sure Start could make Murder Mile a better place to live? Why would anyone think that a child born into a dangerous milieu will be saved by Sure Start from the assault on its wellbeing that everyday life will bring?
Sure Start was always burdened by a New Labour fantasy that early years intervention would inoculate feral children, born to feckless mothers who smoke and screw around, from a career in crime. What evidence was there that early years intervention would, in and of itself, cure a child of criminogenic tendencies, living in a neighbourhood where crime is what works?
Lest we forget, doing something to speed up children's journey towards criminal convictions, through tougher crime measures, was one of the Government's six pledges for its third term. Doing something to protect children from crimes committed against them - including the crime of inequality and injustice - was not among those six pledges.
The target tendency in contemporary politics compounded the impossible dream by demanding results too soon. The just-published national evaluation of Sure Start acknowledges that it is too early to tell, that the services are diverse, too difficult to compare easily with each other, and too recently established.
These services just have not had time to bed in. Thus they have not been able to learn from each other, and staff working with yesterday's training are expected to deliver tomorrow's services.
Sure Start was always isolated from what should have been a comprehensive attack on poverty, sexual violence, social injustice, lamentable educational provision for the poor. Alone, it could never have generated cultural change.
Sure Start has not failed. But something is wrong. The neediest children and parents have been even more disadvantaged than they would have been if they'd lived in non-Sure Start areas - because they have been left with less access to services than they would have been.
We have burdened Sure Start with a pedagogical ambition without addressing the abuse and violence that routinely wrecks children, mothers and their communities. We have disrespected and disinvested in social services, and expected Sure Start to do what social services is no longer able, or expected, to do.
