David Lepper

Labour Party | Brighton Pavilion

Launch of the Centrepoint report on drug misuse and homeless young people in Brighton and Hove

Kings Hotel, Kings Road, Brighton - 21st March 2002

Thanks very much for inviting me to be part of the launch of this important report from Centrepoint on substance misuse services for homeless young people in Brighton and Hove.

I aim to set this report and the work which should come from it in the context of government strategy and policies on drugs and for young people - although I must stress that I am here today as a local MP and not representing the government.

“Crisis situations in the lives of children and young people have been met too often and for too long with uncoordinated responses from a multiplicity of agencies. This array of people and services can add to any child's vulnerability if it is not offered in a co-ordinate and child-centred way.”

That comment from “Tomorrow's Future “ - the March 2001 report of the Children and Young People's Unit - about the setting up of the £380 million Children's Fund targeted at preventative work with 5-13 year olds, encouraging inter-agency work in local neighborhoods, could easily describe the situation faced by many vulnerable young people as well.

The Children and Young People's Unit grew from the what I believe was the current government's most significant step in social policy – initiating the Social Exclusion Unit in December 1997 to investigate the causes of that cycle of deprivation which can lead people – especially young people - to feel that they have no place in the society in which they live - and then to co-ordinate and oversee cross-departmental government action on policies to prevent people becoming excluded in the first place and then getting them back on their feet if they do become excluded.

The Unit is based in the Cabinet Office under the supervision of Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott.

One theme of today's report which mirrors the SEU's motivation is the importance of co-ordination across agencies and official departments at a local level to ensure that resources available are used in the most effective way.

Let me briefly chart the development of this approach.

The Social Exclusion Unit ‘s early work identified and led to policies to deal with

• Low Educational Attainment
• School Exclusions
• Truancy

- as major crucial factors contributing to social exclusion.

On these fronts resources and policies since 1998 have produced steady improvement.

The SEU also investigated teenage pregnancy and the number of Rough Sleepers as signs of that exclusion. Here progress has been more mixed.

Out of the SEU's work came the government's Strategy for Neighbourhood Renewal and the Policy Action Teams to carry it through – including the Policy Action Team on Young People led by Paul Boateng MP, the Deputy Home Secretary, who points out that “Exclusion among young people has emerged as an issue in every SEU report to date.”

That Team made 4 important recommendations in 2000:

• Improve the way the government develops and implements policy for young people,
• Shift the balance of effort and resources over time into preventing young people from encountering the worst problems rather than firefighting when they are already in deep trouble
• Improve individual services for young people
• Design policies around the needs and priorities of young people – not least through involving them in thinking about policies and services and in their delivery.

That final point takes us back to another of the themes of the Centrepoint Report – the importance of listening to those young people for whom the services are actually being provided. Indeed, “Tomorrow's Future” says, “We want to hear the voices of young people, influencing and shaping local services; contributing to local communities; feeling heard; feeling valued; being treated as responsible citizens.

The involvement of local citizens decision-making seems to me to be central to the whole Neighbourhood Renewal Strategy. I think that is right.

But there is much work to be done for as the Home Secretary, David Blunkett said in commenting on the report on last summer's riots in cs0e cities

“The UK has a relatively weak sense of what political citizenship should entail …It is vital that we develop a stronger shared understanding of what collective citizenship means and how we can build that shared commitment into our social and political institutions.”

Just look at the fuss about political indoctrination when the government announced that Citizenship would be part of the National Curriculum.

From the Policy Action Team came the Cabinet Committee chaired by Gordon Brown on Children and Young People's Services bringing together all the Secretaries of State whose services impact on those from 0-19.

Following that came the Children and Young People's Unit in December 2000 with Home Office Minister John Denham having special ministerial responsibilities for children and young people and Education Secretary Estelle Morris reporting to Parliament on the Unit's Work. This brings together the Treasury, the Home Office and the Department for Education and Skills with major cross-departmental responsibilities.

The SEU's work took place, of course, within the framework of improving educational attainment overall and increasing employment opportunities for young people, single parents, the long-term unemployed and people with disabilities through sound economic management and the New Deal schemes. All crucial to combat that poverty and deprivation which can initiate the slide to social exclusion.

There has been a range of policies to support families

• The Working Families tax credit
• The Children's Tax Credit
• Increases in Child Benefit
• The National Minimum Wage
• The National Childcare Strategy
• Sure Start supporting families with pre-school age children and which has been available to our city centre area and is now becoming available to Hollingdean.

The improved and coordinated approach has produced in Children's Social Services the Quality Protects programme over 5 years from 1998.

By 2004 the Connexions service should be available to all aged 13-19 providing advice, guidance, support and personal development and helping to overcome the barriers to participation in learning and work which can inhibit a successful transition from teens to adulthood. The Connexions Card will be to offer a range of discounts and services to young people particularly to encourage involvement in further education.

The SEU has more recently investigated the reasons why and the problems faced by young people who run away. One in nine youngsters have run away for at least one night before the age of 16, but a quarter of those who runaway end up sleeping rough and one in 14 survives through begging, stealing or prostitution.

A further investigation is into the educational attainment of children in care. Children in care are 10 times more likely to excluded from school. A quarter of all prisoners have been in care and one third of rough sleepers have been in care.

Reports on both these issues are due this year, but in the meantime the government's children Leaving Care Act 2000 already requires local councils to provide continuing support and help for young people leaving care until they are 18.

The other strand of government policy to which today's report relates is the 10-year anti-drugs strategy “Tackling Drugs to Build a Better Britain.”

It has targets to reduce the number of people under 25 reporting the use of class A drugs and to reduce the proportion of young people using heroin and cocaine by 25 per cent by 2005 and 50 per cent by 2008.

In addition to funding through Health Action Zones and the Healthy Schools Programme, the Confiscated Assets Fund has been used to set up the Positive Futures projects as part of which, for instance, a partnership of the council, the Albion, South East Dance and Brighton Youth Centre have recently had two years funding announced for drug education and drug prevention work with 10-16 year olds.

The 2000/2001 Budget saw a further £132 million allocated to drug prevention work among young people incorporating these services within existing children's services.

The authors of “Tomorrow's future” say “The war against drugs will never be won by the government alone but it can be won neighbourhood by neighbourhood across the country…”

Here the role of the Drug Action Teams – or our local Drug and Alcohol Action Team- becomes important in integrating services with existing services for children and young people. Centrepoint's report has important recommendations on how that work should incorporate the views of the young people themselves.

I also hope that in view of the high proportion of people interviewed by Centrpoint who described problems of alcohol misuse the report will be a further prompt to the government to publish its long-promised alcohol strategy.

Finally, let me turn to an issue on which- despite the success to some extent of the Rough Sleepers initiative- it seems to me this report can once again provide evidence of the need for more government action – housing.

Nick Raynsford, then Housing Minister, promised that the Homelessness Bill, now going through parliament, will lead to orders or guidance which will give housing authorities a responsibility for homeless 16 and 17 year olds and 18-21 year olds leaving care.

But the government still has to tackle the inequality caused by the Housing Benefit restrictions on under 25 year olds - particularly in high rent areas such as ours- and to reform the way in which local reference rents generally are calculated by the rent officers. Until that happens – or until there is a major investment either by councils or by housing associations in accommodation for single young people a major barrier to social inclusion and to full citizenship will remain.