Over 17,000 troubled families turned around in North West
THE Communities Secretary has hailed
the life changing impact of the Government's Troubled Families programme, which
has now turned around more than 105,000 of the hardest to help households in
England, including over 17,000 in the North West.
Eric Pickles told MPs that 105,671 complex families had benefited from the
support provided by local authority teams by February, putting the programme
firmly on track to achieve the Prime Minister's goal of turning around 120,000
by the end of the parliament.
As well as getting children back into school, putting adults in employment or on
a path back to work and cutting youth crime and anti social behaviour across the
whole household, the new figures showed that the programme had already saved
taxpayers an estimated £1.2 billion, from a maximum government investment of
£448 million.
The average gross cost saving to the taxpayer per troubled family was £12,000,
more than twice the average cost of the programme's intervention at £5,493,
according to a new report which studied costs and benefits across seven areas.
In Manchester, for every £1 invested in the programme, £2.20 in gross benefits
have been realised.
Pickles praised the role of councils in the programme, who have now had
payments by results made for over 90 % of the families the Prime Minister
pledged to turn around. He also made clear that the success of those in the
programme; who have an average of 9 serious problems each including debt,
drugs and domestic violence; showed that no one was beyond help.
Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said:- "The Troubled Families programme
has been a triumph and I am proud that we will deliver the Prime Minister's
ambition to turn around the lives 120,000 of this country's hardest to help
families. It has worked because it has been bold and unafraid of getting tough
with those who need it most. It has also provided a long term solution by
tackling the root causes of the very complex problems these families face. This
innovative approach has not only saved the taxpayer over a billion pounds but
had life changing results for the families involved by giving them a hand up
when they needed it most."
Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander said:- "The success of the
Troubled Families programme in turning around the lives of more than 105,000
families so far while saving taxpayers an estimated £1.2 billion in the process
is proof that we can do more with less. It shows that by working together at
local level, public services can deliver better results for the most vulnerable
people. That's why we've already expanded it into the next Spending Review
period, and I look forward to seeing the principles underpinning this
life-changing programme extended across public services to help more people with
multiple and complex needs."
Head of the Troubled Families programme Louise Casey CB said:- "Behind
these figures are real people in every part of the country whose lives have
changed for the better. Families with nine serious problems each were never
going to be easy to turn around, so all credit to the councils and other
services who have committed to this programme, the many hundreds of frontline
staff who have given their all to these families and most of all to the families
who have had the courage to change and given themselves and their children a
better chance in life than they had before."
Fact file:-
Further information:- The Troubled Families programme applies to England only. Local authorities are
paid up to £4,000 on a payment by results basis for turning around troubled
families. The government's £448 million 3 year budget for 2012 to 2015 is drawn
from 6 Whitehall departments who all stand to benefit from the public sector
working more effectively with troubled families.
Troubled families are defined as those who:-
► Are involved in youth crime or anti-social
behaviour.
► Have children who are excluded from school or regularly truanting.
► Have an adult on out of work benefits.
► Cost the public sector large sums in responding to their problems.
'Turned around' means that:-
► All children have
been back in school for a year when they were previously truant or excluded.
► And youth crime and anti social behaviour has been significantly cut across
the whole family.
► or an adult in the home has moved off benefits and into work for three
consecutive months or more.
The figures from local authorities on progress within the Government's Troubled
Families programme [attached] have been collated from the latest quarterly
returns submitted to DCLG's Troubled Families team from all 152 upper tier local
authorities in England in February 2015. These do not constitute official
statistics.
There are 117,910 families targeted under the government's Troubled Families
programme. For rounding purposes, however, the target is usually referred to as
120,000.
The Benefits of the Troubled Families Programme to the Taxpayer report gives
detailed examples of savings that have been made and costs that have been
avoided for many parts of public services in 7 'exemplar' local authority
areas as part of the Troubled Families programme.
The Understanding Troubled Families report showed that families within the
programme have an average of nine different serious problems including health
and mental health, domestic violence and debt.
At the Spending Round 2013 it was announced that the Troubled Families programme
would be expanded to work with up to 400,000 more families from 2015 onwards.
