A mission to make the difficult possible

We’d been helping government agencies support vulnerable people since 2001, when the Victoria Climbie case was still making headlines. So we’d known for some time that the system for coordinating help when people needed it most was broken.

We’d also realised that serious case reviews were the tip of the iceberg. These systemic problems had also led to an all-time high in the number of children in care and households living in temporary accommodation. Yet resolving them by joining data between agencies was (and often still is) put in the ‘too difficult’ box. 

More than 10 years on, the need for social care professionals to make an impact is bigger than ever before. The Government’s austerity programme has hit the most vulnerable in society the hardest, as all forms of support have been rolled back. And time-poor professionals are struggling under the weight of ever-growing caseloads.

Over the same period, technology has advanced at an unprecedented speed. But its main use has been to make money, not solve society’s fundamental problems. And nearly 20 years after Victoria Climbie, vulnerable adults and children are still dying.

At Xantura, the status quo shocks and frustrates us. But it also galvanises us to keep going. Because the more public sector professionals can access the right insights, at the right time, the more lives can be changed or even saved.