When advocacy in the early years changes

By Dr. Aaron Bradbury

There is a growing silence in the early years sector, and it is not the thoughtful kind that allows space for reflection. It is the kind that appears when people know something is not right, yet feel that speaking out carries more risk than staying quiet. I see it in conversations that trail off, in posts that almost say something but stop short, and in the careful language we use when the truth deserves more clarity.

Early years is full of committed, values-driven people who entered the sector because they believed in children, in play, and in the power of relationships. Yet alongside that commitment, there is a noticeable hesitancy. Speaking honestly about policy, practice, and the erosion of pedagogical integrity increasingly feels unsafe. Advocacy, once central to early childhood work, has quietly become something that needs explaining, defending, or softening.

This did not happen overnight. The messages are rarely explicit, but they are persistent: be careful, don’t rock the boat, think about how this might affect your future. Over time, those messages shape behaviour. Silence begins to look like professionalism. Staying palatable starts to feel responsible. Challenging the system becomes framed as a personal risk rather than a collective necessity.

There is nothing wrong with individual professional journeys. People deserve progression, recognition, and security. But early years has never been an individual pursuit. It is relational at its core, grounded in shared responsibility and collective care. When personal comfort begins to outweigh advocacy for children and the workforce, the sector loses something essential.

I also need to acknowledge something more personal, because it sits at the heart of this silence. Some of the people who once spoke loudly about voice, advocacy, and speaking truth to power in early years no longer engage with me. Not because the work has changed, but because the work has become harder to ignore.

As the conversation has shifted towards challenging policy, naming power, and questioning who early years is really serving, the distance has grown. Engagement has quietly faded. Invitations stop. Conversations end. The message is rarely said out loud, but it is felt: this is becoming uncomfortable.

I do not believe this is simply about disagreement. Disagreement is healthy and necessary in any strong sector. This feels more like caution. A pulling back when advocacy can no longer be neatly contained, when speaking out risks being read as political, inconvenient, or professionally unsafe.

That experience has forced me to reflect not only on my own position, but on what advocacy now means in early years. When those who once encouraged voice retreat from it, it sends a powerful message about who is allowed to speak, and how far that voice is permitted to go. It reveals the unspoken boundaries of acceptable challenge.

This is not about blame or bitterness. It is about honesty. If we only support advocacy when it is comfortable, celebratory, or aligned with our own safety, then we are not truly advocating. We are curating and curated courage does little to disrupt systems that continue to fail children and exhaust the workforce.

Most people did not enter early years to climb ladders or protect positions. They came because they believed children deserve joyful, meaningful childhoods, and that those who care for them deserve trust, respect, and professional autonomy. That belief does not stop being relevant when advocacy becomes inconvenient. If anything, that is precisely when it matters most.

Silence is often framed as neutrality, but it is never neutral. Silence protects what already exists and what already exists is a system that increasingly prioritises accountability over care, outcomes over relationships, and compliance over professional wisdom. The cost of that silence is being paid for by children whose experiences are narrowed, by practitioners who feel unseen and unheard, and by a profession slowly losing confidence in its own voice.

Change does not arrive when it feels safe. It arrives when people decide to speak together, to share the risk, and to remember who this work is really for. Advocacy in early years is not an optional extra. It is an ethical responsibility to children, to the workforce, and to the future of the sector itself.

Writing this feels risky I already have people who have decided no longer to engage with me. But silence has a cost too and right now, that cost feels far greater and I’m afraid needs saying.

The question, then, is not whether we have something worth saying. It is whether we are willing to find our voices again, collectively, and use them while there is still time to do so.