Anne Elizabeth Longfield (born 1960) is a campaigner for children who formerly served as the Children's Commissioner for England. She was formerly chief executive of the charity 4Children. She was appointed the Children's Commissioner for England in March 2015 and was succeeded at the end of February 2021 by Dame Rachel de Souza. Early life and career Longfield was born to mother Jean, who was from a farming family, and father Vincent, an engineer who worked on Concorde. She grew up on a farm on The Chevin near Otley, West Yorkshire, and was educated at Prince Henry's Grammar School, Otley and Newcastle University, where she studied history. Longfield started working in the children's sector in the 1980s as a researcher with Save the Children. She subsequently served as Chief Executive of Kids Clubs Network. Prior to her appointment as Children's Commissioner, Longfield was Chief Executive of 4Children, a leading national children's charity, which delivered early years support, school support and youth services. She held this role for over 20 years. Whilst there she oversaw the huge and rapid expansion of the charity - from employing six people to 1,500 members of staff - and left just before its financial collapse. During her time with 4Children, she worked with Labour minister Harriet Harman on developing Sure Start, and spent a year on secondment at the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit to assist with the programme's delivery. Children's Commissioner Over her time in office the Longfield worked on issues affecting children's mental health, put forward proposals for giving children more power over their digital lives, published research on the experience of children in care, and launched a long-term study and data index on vulnerable children invisible to the state. Under these main areas of research she has made many public interventions, and published a large number of detailed reports exploring, explaining and advocating various solutions to specific aspects of these subjects. She has seen a number of them put into place by Government. Longfield has made many appearances in print and on broadcast media, and has made representations to local and national Government. She has created a digital platform for Children in Care, IMO. Her helpline “Help at Hand”, which aims to address problems raised by children in care, helps around a thousand children a year. In 2020 her office responded to the coronavirus pandemic by producing materials to explain the virus and