07 July 2006
For many young vulnerable people, the statutory sector closes its door on them the moment they hit 18. But thanks to new social inclusion projects, this is changing. Nicola Pauling reports
At 18, Buki Akande was 'stressed, depressed and confused' and her future uncertain. Her home was a YMCA hostel. For reasons she politely avoids discussing, living at the family home was not an option. In fact, options of any kind were in scarce supply.
'I was really down,' she says. 'I'd finished college but I wasn't doing anything, I was just sitting and when I was sitting I was thinking, thinking about so many things but not doing anything.'
Two years later, a confident, articulate 20-year-old is enthusiastically detailing her current hectic study schedule and plans to become a nurse.
Buki's transformation from socially excluded to 'engaged' is thanks to Focus E15, a housing scheme in Stratford, east London.
Across the country, 134 such 'foyer projects', which operate under the aegis of the Foyer Federation, are dedicated to providing housing and training to 10,000 homeless 16–25-year-olds trapped in the no-home-no-job-no-home cycle.
Like an inmate moved from a prison to a palace, Buki can't stop enthusing about her new living arrangements. An apartment in a hulking tower block is all hers. 'In the hostel, I had a little room like a box and I had to eat with everyone else in a big dining room. Here, I have my own bedroom, bathroom and kitchen. Here, I can live independently but with good supervision as well.'
Akande has a key worker and access to counselling, but supervision doesn't just mean someone to watch out for her. She attends life skills classes, art workshops and has had help finding work and a course of study. 'All these things have helped me move on and see a brighter future.'
Akande's success story is one Tony Blair wants to see repeated. In May, the prime minister created the Cabinet-level post of minister for social exclusion, based at the Cabinet Office, to lead the government's latest effort in this area. Former chief whip Hilary Armstrong has been handed the brief, and has pledged concerted cross-government action to reach the estimated 1 million people affected. These include specific high-risk groups, such as elderly people and people with mental health problems. There will be a particular focus on troubled young people, including those in care.
A new social exclusion task force is being set up. It will report to Armstrong, who will also chair a Cabinet sub-committee and publish proposals in the autumn. Although the task force is still at the drawing board stage, according to the Cabinet Office, the expectation is that it will take over the work of the existing Social Exclusion Unit, which is based in the Department for Communities and Local Government.
The hope is that by basing it in one of the central Whitehall departments rather than a spending ministry, it will achieve a sharper focus on the root causes of social exclusion across the full range of government activities. On Armstrong's appointment, Blair wrote urging her to 'underline our government's commitment to social justice through policies to expand opportunity and tackle the most deep-seated causes of symptoms of social exclusion'.
If the government's latest attempt to get to grips with entrenched disadvantage is to succeed where others have failed, grassroots organisations such as East Potential, the organisation that runs Focus E15, will be vital. There's something about its bland yet imposing apartment block that oozes pride, as does managing director David Chesterton.
East Potential is the arm of the East Thames Housing Association committed to social regeneration and creating sustainable neighbourhoods. It runs a programme tackling youth offending, along with culture, arts, employment and training programmes, and is the largest provider of 'foyer accommodation' in the country.
Chesterton corrects the suggestion that the late teens and early 20s are a tough age. 'This isn't about age, it's about stage. You can have a young person who's 18 or 19 but for an abundance of reasons is at the stage most 16-year-olds would be.'
And there, in a sound bite, is the problem facing the Social Exclusion Unit. Director Claire Tyler says: 'There's been a very strong focus in policy over the last few years on getting services for the 0–19-year-olds right and we support that very strongly. But we've found because of that there's been less focus on the needs of the 16–25-year-olds and also with people thinking that once someone is no longer a teenager, the problems go away.'
These 'transition years' were the focus of a report released by the SEU late last year. Its in-depth research found that the problems associated with the teenage years were still plaguing people from disadvantaged backgrounds well into their 20s and that services for this group were limited and sometimes inappropriate.
The enforcement of artificial age barriers by many service providers was found to be a particular stumbling block. Tyler explains: 'A young person might just get used to dealing with an agency and suddenly that [relationship] comes to an abrupt end and they're moved into adult services, which function in a very different way and perhaps aren't as conscious of some of the issues around the transition to adulthood.'
In particular, she says, the youth justice system, drug support and mental health services have to start taking a more needs-based approach to young people 'rather than saying, “right you're 19, you're nothing to do with us”, when that person might just be starting to get the support they need'.
The SEU has also highlighted a failure to use Individual Support Orders. These are civil orders designed to compel a young person to get the support they need to address the underlying causes of antisocial behaviour. While antisocial behaviour orders are now common, the tagging on of an Iso is not. SEU figures put the ratio at one Iso to every 74 Asbos.
The two orders together represent an approach that is both punitive and preventative, the stick and the carrot. And as the government last week launched its latest effort to implement its 'respect agenda', unveiled with much fanfare at the beginning of the year, the carrot is all the more important.
'Isos are meant to complement an Asbo for [anyone] who would benefit from that structured support,' says Tyler. 'But our research indicated that many working within the criminal justice system didn't know about Isos or how to effect one. Now we're working to promote Isos and there's extra funding to help implement them.'
That approach is exactly what the Transitions report recommends. In particular, the importance of a continuing relationship with a trusted adult. A one-stop shop, says Tyler. 'They want someone who can come up with some sort of package of support which covers all aspects of their lives rather than having to go from one agency to another and another and another and retelling their story.'
David Chesterton has been working with vulnerable young people in London for more than 30 years and knows East Potential is leading by example. So, he says, is the current government. But decisions are not always thought through and projects such as his are still vulnerable to policy 'stuff-ups' – such as the decision to focus funding on NVQ Level Two qualifications.
You can sense what's coming before Chesterton says it. 'The reality is many of our clients require a number of stepping stones, simply to get to an NVQ level two. It has had the direct effect of disadvantaging some of the most disadvantaged young people in our society. [The government] didn't intend to do that, but they haven't worked out how to solve it.'
It is these types of unintended consequences that Armstrong's task force will have to anticipate and overcome if it is to succeed in extending to the excluded million the opportunities that the rest of us take for granted – people like Akande. When she first arrived at the Foyer, her needs were complex. It wasn't just about a roof over her head, or a job, or a course of study, it was about the rest of her life.
Complex equals costly, but Akande will repay her debt, and then some, simply by her decision to become a nurse. And, as the media keeps reminding us, failure to include the excluded is a social cost we cannot afford.
PFjul2006
