10.09.13
Troubled Families scheme improving lives of 14,000
14,000 troubled families have had their lives “turned around”, the Government has announced. The Troubled Families scheme has been working with 50,000 families over the past 15 months, with a total of 80,000 of the hardest to help families identified.
The success includes getting truanting children back in school and reducing levels of youth crime, anti-social behaviour and costs, as determined by the DCLG’s financial framework.
Adults are also being helped to get off benefits and into work. The figures are submitted by local authorities to the Troubled Families team, with councils paid up to £4,000 through a payment by results scheme.
Prime minister David Cameron said: “I am determined that we help people to get on in life, including those families where things may be going wrong. For some, that starts with attending school every day, staying out of trouble with the police and taking practical steps towards work, just as other families do. Every month more and more of the most troubled families are getting help to deal with these issues head-on. That is good for those families, their community and our country as a whole.”
Communities secretary Eric Pickles added: “These figures show that our no-nonsense and common sense approach is changing these families for the better and benefiting the whole community. Considering the often longstanding and deep-seated nature of these families’ problems, it is a huge achievement to have turned so many around in such a short space of time. And instead of several costly services working with the same family but failing to solve the underlying problems, this approach is both more effective for the family and cheaper too.”
Head of the Troubled Families programme Louise Casey said: “Councils deserve credit for taking up the challenge of the Troubled Families programme and achieving results so quickly. By dealing with all the family members and all of their problems in a tough and intensive way we are finally getting to grips with problems which may have persisted for generations, giving hope to people who have often been failed in the past and relief for the communities that suffered the effects of their behaviour.”
The results were announced as Casey and Pickles visited the troubled families programme, Families 1st, in the Royal Borough of Greenwich. This scheme has turned around 163 of its 790 troubled families, and is working with 358.
Cllr Chris Roberts, leader of the Royal Borough of Greenwich said: “The key to helping families in crisis comes from within the home itself. Families 1st works by providing the catalyst for families to recognise their problems and to recognise that if they actively engage with the scheme they will get all the help they need to make a better future for themselves and their children.
“Families 1st is a central part of the Royal Borough’s anti-poverty strategy which promotes economic growth and regeneration and increasing access to local jobs.”
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