Social inequality and social disadvantage provide an all too fertile soil that sustains the majority of the serious mental health problems suffered by children in our society.

The complexity of the issues clinicians routinely encounter in working with children with mental health problems is widely acknowledged. However, few books concern themselves with how such difficult populations can be effectively approached and the strategies that are likely to deliver effective treatment to them. This book, based on a highly successful seminar for grant-giving children's charities held at the Anna Freud Centre and sponsored by John Lyon's Charity, provides pragmatic solutions to this major therapeutic challenge of our age. The chapters bridge statutory and voluntary initiatives and are held firmly together by the commitment to evidence-based, systematically offered, programmatic and innovative approaches that can help those who, although hard to reach, are in greatest need of our efforts: the socially excluded children and families in our society. As such, this book will be invaluable to psychologists, psychotherapists, counselors and family therapists.