WISERD Director, Professor Gareth Rees, was one of a panel of speakers involved in a What Works Wales event on Friday 17th May. The event was organised by the Alliance for Useful Evidence in collaboration with the Big Lottery Fund and in partnership with Wales Public Services 2025.
The seminar was the Alliance’s first event in Wales and focused on addressing the question of whether Wales could become a leader in Europe as an experimental lab championing evidence based policy and public sector innovations.
The overall aim of this event was to generate discussion regarding whether Wales could set a new standard for how public services experiment, apply ‘what works’ and above all how to make it happen.
The well attended session, including delegates from the Welsh Government, concluded with some key outcomes:
- Recommendation for the Alliance to promote communication (evidence provision) between practitioners, researchers and policy makers;
- Citizens are a crucial resource for both evidence and public sector innovation;
- Related to the above, the importance of stakeholder engagement with evidence;
- Co-design, co-production and collaboration are key factors – the importance of making connections;
- Let’s share the data and share the questions, developing a steady dialogue between researchers, practitioners and policy makers
Event Chair, Sir Adrian Webb concluded, “Wales can become leaders in policy if we learn to cut out the stuff which we know doesn’t work.”
For further information on the event, visit: www.alliance4usefulevidence.org/event/what-works-wales/