The reasons for doing this research were:

• a lot research work is going on, BUT researchers are still learning as they go along and can benefit from sharing more
• there is some commissioning and funding of inclusive research, BUT funding bodies don’t always have clear ideas about how to evaluate inclusive research
• there is a lot of talk about working together, BUT less is understood about what this means in practice (Simone Aspis has written about this)
• there is debate about the challenges of doing inclusive research, BUT sometimes this debate is stifled and the difficult things aren’t talked about enough (Jan Walmsley and Kelly Johnson have written about this)
• we have learned a lot about doing inclusive research, BUT there are new things to learn now about what kinds of knowledge inclusive research can produce, how we know it can be trusted, and how good science and good inclusive research come together (Gordon Grant and Paul Ramcharan have written about this)
• SO, we saw an urgent need to bring people together to talk about how we do research inclusively, how we know when we do it well, and what we can learn from talking and reflecting together.